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Digitized by the Internet Archive 
In 2022 with funding from 
Princeton Theological Seminary Library 


https ://archive.org/details/spiritriddenkondOOmack_0 


THE SPIRIT-RIDDEN KONDE 


NEW & RECENT BOOKS 


Through Khiva to Golden 


Samarkand. 
The remarkable story of a woman's 
adventurous journey alone through 
the deserts of Central Asia to the 
Heart of Turkistan. By Etta R, 
CurisTi£z, F.R.G,S., Fellow of the 
Royal Scottish Geographical Society, 
Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries 
ofScotland. Illus. & Map. 21s.n. 
Among Papuan Headhunters. 
An account of the manners & customs 
ofthe old Fly River headhunters, with 
a description of the secrets of the 
initiation ceremonies divulged by 
those who have passed through all the 
different orders of the craft, by one 
who has spent many years in their 
midst. By E. Baxter RILEY, 
F.R.A.IL. 
28 Illus. 6° 2 Maps. ais. n. 
The Spirit-ridden Konde. 
Arecord of the interesting but steadily 
vanishing customs & ideas gathered 
during twenty-four years’ residence 
amongst these shy inhabitants of the 
Lake Nyasa Region, from witch- 
doctors, diviners, hunters, fishers & 
every native source. By D. R. 
MacKenzig, F.R.G.S. 
: Illus. & Maps. ars. n. 
Mysteries of the Libyan Desert. 
By W. J. Harpine Kinc. Author 
of ‘‘ A Search for Masked Tawareks.” 
With 45 Illus. & 3 Maps. ars. n. 
The Vanishing Tribes of Kenya. 
By Major G, St. J. ORpE Browne, 
0:53.30, 8.5.G.5., BRA. F.Z.S; 
Senior Commissioner, Tanganyika, 
Illus. & 2 Maps, ars. n. 
Seconda Edition, 
The Menace of Colour. 
A comprehensive survey of the dan- 
gers of the ever-increasing tide of 
colour which threatens the supremacy 
of the white races. Prof. J. W. 
Grecory, D.5Sc.,, F.R.S., Professor of 
Geology, Glasgow University. 
Illus. & Maps. ras. 6d.n. 


Second Edition. 


The Autobiography & African. 
aie FrasER, D.D. Illus. 6s. 
“Unique. . . . Missionary work 
as seen through the native eye 
andmind. .. . The central figure, 
a chief’s warrior son, will rejoice 
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An Intimate Description of the Private 

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“Nothing more intimate has been 

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Third Edition. 

Among Wild Tribes of the 

Amazons. C.W. Domvitte-Fire.21s.n. 
“A most thrilling description of 
thrilling experiences.”—Sat. Rev. 
‘ Third Edition. 

African Idylls. 

By the Very Rev. DonaLp FRASER, 
D.D. With Illustrations. 6s. nett. 
\ Third Edition. 

Prehistoric Man and His Story. 
Prof. G. F. Scorr ELiiot, M.A.(Can- 
tab),B.Sc.(Edin.). s6Illus. ros. 6d.n. 

SEELEY, SERVICE & CO. LTD. 


, ie, 








AN ITINERANT ENTERTAINER. 


He is dressed in skin and feather head-dress, armlets, skin kilt, and body rings, the 

number of which latter indicates his social position. He carries, as professional 

properties, a spear, a skin pack, rattles. horns, bells, and a stringed musical 
instruinent, 





THE SPIRIT-RI 
KONDE 


A RECORD OF THE INTERESTING BUT STEADILY VANISHING 
CUSTOMS & IDEAS GATHERED DURING TWENTY-FOUR 
YEARS’ RESIDENCE AMONGST THESE SHY INHABI- 
TANTS OF THE LAKE NYASA REGION, FROM 
WITCH-DOCTORS, DIVINERS, HUNTERS, 

FISHERS & EVERY NATIVE 
SOURCE 


at 
i 


’ 
LARIOA 
MUU LE 





BY 


D. R. "MACKENZIE, F.R.G.S. 


WITH MANY ILLUSTRATIONS 
& A MAP 


London 
Seeley, Service & Co. Limited 
196 Shaftesbury Avenue 
1925 


PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN 


TO 


MY WIFE 





Preface 


HIS book is not an attempt to depict the 

daily life of the Konde people; it rather 

aims at indicating, so far as an outsider can, 

the leading ideas and practices which make 
up the background, leaving to others the task of 
bringing the foreground into proper relief. And, 
after many years’ residence and work among the 
Konde, I feel increasingly how much the fact of being 
a foreigner among them limits one’s understanding of 
the people whose ideas he attempts to set down on 
paper. The task has been undertaken largely at the 
request of some of the leading men of the tribe, 
who are alive to the fact that the old days are passing, 
even among the conservative Konde, and that, if a 
record is to be made at all, it must be made without 
delay. 

There is no one to whom I must acknowledge 
indebtedness to the same extent as I must, and now 
do, to native chiefs and common people, educated 
and otherwise ; to doctors, diviners, hunters, fishers ; 
every kind of native in fact, from whom I have caught 
hints, in sudden and unintentional flashes of revela- 
tion, or in sustained conversation, of what is in the 
Bantu mind. And therefore I have, in most chapters, 
aimed at using language which indicates the native 
attitude to the various beliefs dealt with ; an attitude 
in most cases of unquestioning faith. 


X1 


Xi Preface 


The photographs I owe almost entirely to others : 
to Major J. Stuart Wells, C.B.E., lately of the Tan- 
ganyika Civil Service; Capt. Perkins, Ist King’s 
African Rifles, and Mr. E. C. Richards, Administrative 
Officer, and the Rev. M. H. Faulds, of Isoko. To 
the Rev. D. M. Brown, M.D., of Itete, I am indebted 
for the map which accompanies the book. 

I have again and again drawn upon my wife’s 
knowledge of the people, especially of the women and 
children, and to her suggestions I owe very much. 
By permission of the Editor of the Expository Times 
use has been made of part of the material of an 
article on ‘Christianity and the African Mind” 
which I contributed to that magazine some years ago. 


D. R. MacKenzie. 


K-yIMBILA, TANGANYIKA TERRITORY, 
February, 1925. 


Contents 


CHAPTER I 
Tue LAND AND THE PEOPLE 


CHAPTER II 


VILLAGE LIFE . 


CHAPTER III 
KonpE CHILDREN : : c 


CHAPTER IV 


HusBaAND AND WIFE 


CHAPTER. V 
Tue CuieFr AND His CounsELLors 


CHAPTER VI 


Law AND CRIME 


CHAPTER VII 
Tutncs ForBIDDEN . : s 


CHAPTER VIII 


Domestic ANIMALS: AGRICULTURE . 


CHAPTER IX 


EATING AND DRINKING 


CHAPTER X 
HunTInc AND FIsHING 2 : 


CHAPTER XI 
ARTS AND CRAFTS : . 


CHAPTER XII 
AMUSEMENTS AND RELAXATIONS 


Xill 


PAGE 


17 


26 


41 


55 


68 


80 


2 


109 


122 


132 


156 


X1V Contents 


CHAPTER XIII 


KonpE WARFARE 


CHAPTER XIV 


Tue SupREME BEING 


CHAPTER XV 


THe ANCESTRAL SPIRITS . i ; 


CHAPTER XVI 


Tue WorsHIP OF THE SPIRITS 


CHAPTER XVII 


Tue ForeETELLERS 


CHAPTER XVITi 


DIVINATION AND THE LoT 


CHAPTER XIX 


OmENS AND PorTENTS 


CHAPTER XX 


Tue Powers or Evit: IJ. Witcucrart 


CHAPTER XXI 


Tue Powers or Evit: II. Desrructive AGENCIES 


CHAPTER XXII 


SICKNESS AND MEDICINE 


CHAPTER XXIII 
Wonper MEDICINE . ; 2 ‘ 


CHAPTER XXIV 
DeaTH AND Buriau L ; 


CHAPTER XXV 
Tue Brave Days or Otp 


INDEX . ¥ 


PAGE 


167 


178 


190 


200 


215 


225 


237 


251 


263 


270 


286 


393 


311 


List of Illustrations 


An ITINERANT ENTERTAINER . ‘ ; - Frontispiece 

FACING PAGE 
A Konpe Vititacr, Laxe Suore Tyre : ieee: 
Topacco SMOKING ; - P : : se OA 


A Younc Woman . ; : : : : “ua Od. 
A PROFESSIONAL DANCER . , : : , : 80 
SaLT Factory at Lake Ruxwa : } ; > 80 


A Pustic Dance : : : t : eles) 


A Banana-Lear UMBRELLA : ' : : ee TS 
SIFTING . : ; : ; ‘ : ‘ fF e125 
GRINDING : : : : : : : eee 
Game Traps FOR SMALL ANIMALS. : : sh Lae 
Carico-MakInc : : ; ; ; ‘ ee eaG 
Hovusr-ButLp1ne f : : : : : en ay 
Men’s Dance ‘ : ; ‘ , ; tmp tse 
A Konpe Hur . . , : : ; See 


XV 


XVI List of Illustrations 


Lion HuntTine ‘ ;. : 3 z 


In THE Kinca Movuntains 


DANCING AT A FEAST : 
A PROHIBITIONIST . : a . ss 
A Deatu Dance . 


Various MoveEMENTs IN THE DeatH Dance (3) 


FACING PAGE 


176 
208 
240 
272 
288 


» 296 


The Spirit-Ridden Konde 


GHAPTER I 
The Land & the People 


NGONDE, as the Konde people call 

their country, lies around the north end 

of Lake Nyasa. Northwards of that 

point it stretches for about fifty miles, 
and southwards for roughly the same distance. Like 
all their neighbours, the Konde belong to the great 
Bantu race, which occupies Africa from the Cape to 
the Congo, and beyond. 

The lake shore plain is narrow, fertile, and populous, 
with its centre at Karonga, where there is a British 
Magistrate, some trading stores, and a station of the 
Livingstonia Mission of the United Free Church of 
Scotland. Beyond the plain the tribe, under various 
local names, reaches up into the mountains on both 
sides of the lake. Outside of Nyasaland, and north- 
wards across the Songwe, it covers a large area in 
what was once German East Africa, but is now known 
as ‘Tanganyika Territory. Here, too, the plain is hot, 
fertile, and populous as at Karonga. Northwards of 
the plain lie the healthy uplands of, Mwamba and 


B 17 


18 The Land & the People 


Bukukwe, culminating, so far as the peopled regions 
are concerned, in Tukuyu, five thousand feet above 
sea-level, the residence of the Administrative Officer 
and his staff, with Post and Telegraph Offices, and a 
large Government Hospital. Here also are many 
small trading stores, conducted by Indians and 
Somali; and a little to the south is the Kyimbila 
Station of the Scottish Churches Mission, carrying on 
the work of the exiled German missionaries. Still 
further to the south, and less elevated, is the British 
military post of Masoko. 

The population of these fertile and healthy high- 
lands is dense. From Tukuyu or Kyimbila, looking 
south and west, numerous villages, each hidden in its 
banana grove, fill the view westwards to the Bundali 
Hills, where the Kibira River is marked out by a 
morning mist, and southwards towards the lake, thirty 
miles distant. In this region the people call them- 
selves Nyakyusa, with a number of local names 
indicating no difference of origin or language. ‘The 
soil is so fertile, and the rain usually so abundant, 
that in many places two crops are taken annually of 
some foodstuffs, while of the others the single crop is 
so great that scarcity, no uncommon occurrence in 
some parts of Central Africa, is rarely experienced. 

The Bundali Hills close in this happy valley (for in 
spite of its elevation the country has the appearance 
of a valley) on the west; and beyond them, after a 
most exhausting march, over lofty summits, through 
deep ravines threaded by bridgeless rivers, one comes 
to the home of the Bandali, a race of hardy 


Ths Land & the People 19 


highlanders closely related to the Konde. Here, at 
Isoko, is another station of the Scottish Churches 
Mission. 

Eastwards of the Tukuyu uplands lie the Kinga 
Mountains, better known as the Livingstone Range, 
near the foot of which lies the Itete Station of the 
Scottish Churches Mission. From here one gets a 
view of lake and mountain, river and plain, which 
may well be regarded as one of the finest of the kind 
in Africa. The evening sun, shining upon the great 
mountain mass, reveals hundreds of crevices and folds 
in which lie tiny houses, beside waterfalls or rapidly 
dashing streams; while up to the summits stretch 
the wheat-fields, green or golden yellow in the evening 
light. At one’s feet sleep the countless villages, 
banana hidden; and away in the distance Lake 
Nyasa reflects the last gleams of departing day. 

Over the mountains lies the country of the Kinga 
people, a land indescribably rough and mountainous, 
but here and there well watered, with fertile valleys 
producing wheat, oats, peas, in abundance, besides 
the usual African products. Here the cold is so great 
that during part of the year many of the people sleep 
in pits hollowed out of the ground, and heated by 
fires which are extinguished at bed-time. 

Northwards the upland valley is bounded by the 
Igale Hills, from the top of which one looks to the 
lofty Mbeye Mountain, which from one point of 
view presents an astonishing likeness to Arthur’s Seat 
and the Salisbury Crags at Edinburgh. Beyond Igale 
live the Sango and the Safwa, the former a vigorous 


20 The Land & the People 


and warlike tribe, the latter until recently their 
oppressed subjects and slaves. 

The earliest traditions go back to a time when the 
Konde dwelt in Malongo, in the area now known as 
Mahenge. ‘There their god Ngeketo, roused to wrath 
by three attempts to destroy him, abandoned them, 
and is now the God of the white men. Whether on 
this account, or for some other reason, a great migra- 
tion brought them to the country north of the 
Songwe River, where they settled down, no doubt 
conquering older inhabitants. At some unknown 
time, but before the Angoni reached so far north in 
their great march from Zululand, the Sango, neigh- 
bours of the Konde northwards, were driven out of 
their homes by intertribal warfare. ‘They broke 
down over the intervening mountains, and overcame 
the unwarlike Konde, among whom they settled down 
as chiefs, retaining until now the tradition of their 
Sango ancestry. Whether at the same or another 
time, the Kinga, probably for the same reason— 
pressure from behind—swarmed down the steep 
mountain passes, and established themselves in the 
Nserya region. 

One of the leading Kinga chiefs was Mwangonde, 
who, under the name of Chungu, occupied land at 
Kabari, near the Mwakeleli Mission Station. His 
son, Kyabara Chungu, setting out with an armed 
force in search of more fertile garden land, met with 
varying fortunes, until he was finally obliged to cross 
the Songwe into what later became Nyasaland. In 
this region Chungu seems to have made easy con- 


The Land & the People 21 


quests. He passed through the mountain region 
north and west of Karonga, receiving the submission 
of the chiefs as he went; thence he descended into 
the plain at Karonga, finally establishing himself at 
Mpande, where his descendants still live. 

The legends which have gathered around the 
person of Chungu reveal him as a man of impressive 
personality. One legend states that having estab- 
lished himself at Karonga, he cast longing eyes on the 
regions on the other side of Lake Nyasa. With a 
great following he went down to the lake, smote the 
water with his sceptre, and crossed on dry land. 
Receiving the submission of the people, he returned 
as he went ; followed later, but in canoes, by a great 
multitude of people, who wished to settle under the 
shadow of so great a chief. ‘The European attitude 
towards this event is shared by native Christians, but 
quite intelligent pagans meet scepticism, quietly and 
gravely, with the statement that “‘ Chungu is the man 
who speaks with God.” ‘The incident, or whatever 
event it represents in its present form, can only be 
satisfactorily accounted for by regarding it as what 
the Higher Critics call a “‘ later accretion’; for the 
Angoni, with their own story of a similar crossing of 
the Zambesi, had not yet arrived, the Arabs were 
still in the distance, and direct Christian influence 
did not begin for many years afterwards. 

It is needless to give in detail the history of his 
successors. One lost much land to rival chiefs; 
another was deposed because he could not give rain 
ina time of drought. ‘The country fell into confusion: 


22 The Land & the People 


Prophets arose who foretold the coming of the Angoni 
and the Arabs to work havoc on land and people. 
Then from the lake would come the strange white 
man who would overcome Angoni and Arab, and 
give peace to the land. To this race the people were 
directed to submit themselves when they came. So 
deep and sure would the peace be, that men would go 
armed only with sticks, all need for spear and shield 
having passed away. 

But the peace was still in the future. Arab and 
Angoni came and fulfilled their destiny. ‘The Henga 
or Kamanga people, fleeing before the latter, were 
received by the Konde, and were at first friendly to 
their hosts, but later, when the Arabs arrived as 
traders and slavers, made an alliance with them 
against the harassed Konde. Into this confusion 
entered, very dramatically, the white man, of whose 
coming the natives give graphic accounts. ‘The 
approach of the Jala, the tiny steamer of the Living- 
stonia Mission, then operating from Cape Maclear, 
far to the south, struck the people with terror. “ It 
is God,” they said, ‘‘ He walks on the water.” As the 
little vessel drew near the land, the people fled into 
the bush. A white man landed. A few strong- 
hearted natives ventured to approach, and saw his 
white skin. ‘It is surely God,” they said, ‘ He has 
come to us in the likeness of men.’ When he ate 
some bananas in their presence, they said, “‘ No, not 
God, but a friend of His.” 

In 1887 the African Lakes Corporation of Glasgow 


The Land & the People 23 


opened a trading store at Karonga, under Mr. 
Monteith Fotheringham, a man of great vigour and 
capacity. His presence aroused the hostility of the 
Arabs, who feared the loss of their slaving profits, and 
a period of fighting followed, in which the Konde 
took sides with the white man as their one hope. 
After a great encounter with their enemies, the de- 
feated Konde took refuge in the Kambwe lagoon, the 
dry reeds on the margin of which were set on fire by 
the victors. ‘The helpless natives leaped into the 
water, where many were drowned, and numbers 
were taken by the crocodiles which swarmed in the 
lagoon. In 1895 a small force was moved up by Sir 
Harry Johnston, High Commissioner for the newly 
formed British Protectorate, and the Arabs were 
defeated, and their leader, Mlozi, hanged the same 
day. From that time the Konde have progressed in 
peace under the influence of Government, ‘Trade, 
and Missions. 

One incident, very striking in itself, may be given 
as indicating the influence of Chungu. On one of 
her trips the Domira, the steamer of the African Lakes 
Corporation, went ashore on the sands near Karonga. 
Vigorous but unsuccessful efforts were made, with the 
help of great gangs of natives, to float her; and at 
length Chungu was asked to lend his powerful aid. 
This was Chungu Mwakasungula II. Taking with 
him a white cock, he went with his councillors to 
where the stranded steamer lay helpless on the sand. 
The following prayer, which he offered, was given to 


24 The Land & the People 


me by the son of one of the councillors who stood 
near him: 


“Art Thou angry with me, O God, who didst 
redeem me from slavery? ‘The Angoni mocked 
me, the Arabs mocked me; then didst Thou cause 
me to see these mighty ones (the Europeans) ; and 
I said, ‘ Rejoice, for God has heard my prayers.’ 
Who, then, of my ancestors is angry? Against 
whom have [ sinned? For it is they who are my 
helpers in speaking to Thee. Many of them died 
by the spear; they saw their families destroyed ; 
they suffered hunger again and again, before the 
mighty ones came. Now, O God, be merciful, and 
let the feet of these men come up out of the water.”’ 


Then taking water in his mouth he squirted it north 
and south saying, “I am lord of that country, I 
Magemo: I am lord of that country, | Kyabara,” to 
which the assembled councillors responded, “E! 
Magemo; E! Kyabara.” ‘Then whirling the cock 
over his head and dipping it in the water, he gave the 
signal to the men hanging on the ropes to pull. And 
the steamer floated off into the water ! 

Meantime in the north internal warfare went on 
intermittently, but no man of outstanding capacity 
arose to give cohesion to the various families of the 
Nyakyusa. Before the arrival of the Moravian 
missionaries in the area in 1891, various Europeans 
visited the district. Hunters came and went, and for 
a brief space there was a station of the Livingstonia 
Mission not far from Tukuyu. In 1893 the German 


The Land & the People 25 


Government established a station at Lumbira on the 
lake shore, but removed later to Tukuyu. On the 
whole the new Government was well received. A 
rising in 1897 was so mercilessly dealt with that any 
discontent which might be felt was suppressed by the 
fear of the German machine-guns. Very slowly the 
district is being merged in the general progress arising 
out of European domination. 

Around the lake shore cotton is being successfully 
cultivated by natives and Europeans. On the uplands 
near ‘Tukuyu there are some coffee plantations, and 
the suitability of the soil for the cultivation of flax is 
being tested. Coal has been found in the hills to the 
west, but its commercial value has still to be proved ; 
and a small quantity of mica is also being digged. 
Up in the north, on the Lupa River, but outside the 
Konde region, gold has been discovered, but appar- 
ently only in modest quantities. ‘There are at present 
about three score of miners at work there. 


CHAPTER II 
Village Life 


HE typical Konde village has very little in 

common with a European one. Here and 

there one will come on villages neatly laid 

out in streets or rows, usually with the 
ends, rather than the sides, facing the road; fre- 
quently with a clump of bananas separating one house 
from another. But much more common is the village 
in which each house is hidden in its own banana grove ; 
or where at one point one may find three or four huts 
grouped together, at another perhaps a solitary hut, 
yonder, again, two or three are near each other; but 
everywhere surrounded by bananas growing close up 
to the houses. Or, in a few places, the tall maize 
conceals the houses from view in the growing season, 
leaving them exposed, after the harvest, to the eye of 
all passers-by. 

From a distance nothing is seen but the wide 
spreading banana leaves. In the early morning from 
hundreds of huts smoke rises into the still air, as the 
sleepers rouse themselves and lay fresh wood on the 
fire which has been smouldering all night, unless 
some one has wakened and stirred the dying embers. 


One by one the villagers emerge from the houses, and 
26 


Village Life 27 


sit in the sun, greeting neighbours with a polite 
“Have you slept well? ” if there are any neighbours 
near. ‘Then the husband milks the cattle, and the 
boys come to drive them out to the pasture, where 
they will remain until the early afternoon, when they 
are again milked. 

Generally the cattle sleep in the same house as their 
owners, tied up to stakes fixed deep in the floor ; but 
where there are grown-up sons not yet married, a 
separate house is built in which the parents sleep with 
the little ones, while the young men guard the cattle 
from raiding thieves. 

The bed is frequently no more than a mat spread 
on the mud floor, with a single blanket for covering, 
and no pillow, unless it is a piece of roughly trimmed 
wood. ‘The more prosperous natives, earning good 
pay in the employment of Europeans, have well-made 
beds fully equipped, in many cases even with mosquito 
nets hung from the roof. The poorer consider that 
they have made a great step forward if they have 
been able to save up enough money to buy a single 
blanket, and not seldom even that belongs to the 
father, the mother and children having to be content 
with meagre coverings of calico or grass mats. But 
the house is warm, often too warm, for the fire is 
always burning, the door is closed, there are no 
windows, and there is no ventilation in the roof; 
and all the inmates sleep with their feet to the fire, 
which is in the middle of the floor. 

Here and there one will come upon rows of tiny 
houses, each built and occupied by two or three small 


28 Village Life 


boys, who have grown too big to occupy any longer 
the single-roomed hut in which their parents dwell. 
They are slender erections of reed and grass, and look 
as if a strong wind might carry them away ; but the 
children live a happy, and not always innocent, life in 
these huts until they are able to build bigger ones for 
themselves. 

Dress is more conspicuous by its absence than by 
its presence. During the day the women wear little 
but a long strip of bark cloth hanging down almost to 
the ground before and behind. The children usually 
have nothing at all, unless they have the good fortune 
to get a strip of cloth from a grandparent. They go 
about quite naked for the first few years of life, and a 
mission school usually reveals rows of children who 
consist of long legs and arms and smiling faces, 
wholly unconscious of need if they have a tiny rag 
strung in front, often not more than a few square 
inches in size. But the men who are earning money 
may be well dressed. "The richer wear trousers and 
jacket, a shirt, a collar and tie, boots, if they are able 
to afford them, anda helmet. 'Their wives and children 
wear long robes of highly coloured cloths, and are no 
doubt observed with envy by their less fortunate 
sister-women, with little but a piece of bark-cloth to 
hide their nakedness. ‘The average man, however, 
goes to church or market with a single garment, 
unsewn, flung over his shoulders, and covering, more 
or less completely, his whole body ; but he goes to 
work in a scanty waist cloth, which leaves him un- 
covered below the knees and above the waist. Men 


Village Life 29 


of social position are known by the number of manyeta 
(body rings worn on the waist) which they wear: 
one for a man or woman just “‘ above the common ” ; 
six or seven for a man of high standing. A few women 
have begun, to their own great discomfort, to wear 
the immense coils of brass or iron on wrists or ankles 
which are so popular among other tribes. 

Clothes, says an acknowledged authority on the 
subject, make the man. Not among the Konde. 
Chunegu is a great chief, but his greatness does not 
depend on what he wears, although there are occa- 
sions when he dresses more carefully than at other 
times. ‘This almost naked man is regarded with a 
reverence greater than is granted to any but a very 
few Europeans, and out of all recognition greater 
than is felt for the native who swaggers about in 
boots and helmet and white man’s clothes. ‘The 
respect which is accorded to a European depends 
to-day (though it did not in the past) upon his personal 
character, his control of resources, the authority which 
has been bestowed upon him by others. But Chungu, 
with hundreds of other chiefs throughout Bantu 
Africa, has a respect which is gained in a totally 
different fashion. He is in close touch with unseen 
powers. His prayers have a compelling power, his 
benediction is priestly, his curse of fearful validity. 
He is a channel through which may come weal or 
woe upon the land; and hence his authority depends 
in no degree upon such an accident as dress. 

By almost all who know them the Konde are re- 


garded as lazy. And to the bustling, and perhaps 


20 Village Life 


unobservant European, village life affords abundant 
justification for the charge; while even the most 
observant and sympathetic must admit that they are, 
to put it mildly, a people with a large amount of 
unimproved leisure on their hands. ‘here is, in 
truth, a good deal of idle lounging in the sun, and it 
is thoroughly enjoyed; and so long as it remains 
unproved that the restless energy of the white man 
has succeeded in securing the best possible conditions 
for the great masses of his race, just so long will 
some white men, and a vast majority of black, 
decline to admit that the African is altogether on 
the wrong path, and the European altogether on 
the right. 

If the year has been a good one, the father has very 
little care upon his shoulders: his barns are well 
filled, and hunger is not likely to trouble him and his 
family ; his children are healthy, and perhaps doing 
well at the little mission school ; he has paid his tax, 
and the precious certificate, signed by the magistrate, 
is carefully laid away in some place of safety; his 
house is re-thatched, and will keep out the rain; his 
cattle and sheep and goats are away with the village 
herd, and looked after as part of the village property. 
If he wants a little money for immediate use, he can 
go to the nearest white man with a sheep or a goat 
for sale, or perhaps his wife will go with fowls or eggs, 
or a bunch of bananas. Finally, if he is religiously 
Inclined, whether he is a Christian or not, he has 
probably been to church on Sunday, a fact which 
adds to his sense of personal well-being during the 


Village Life 31 
week. He has, then, no reason for doing any more 
work. Work has yielded him all that he requires, and 
he may lie in the sun and chat lazily, or move about 
strumming his pango (stringed instrument) with that 
supreme unconsciousness of being an idler, which is to 
some so irritating, to others so charming, a character- 
istic of the African. 

All this, however, is ideal, and seldom corresponds 
to the actual fact. The year may have been a bad 
one; ill-health may have overtaken himself or his 
family ; his cattle may be dying; or he may have 
failed to find employment after long trekking in 
search of it, and consequently his tax is unpaid and 
trouble is hanging over him. But a normal year, 
neither unusually prosperous nor unusually disastrous, 
will reveal how the Konde fill in their time. Let it 
be understood that they see nothing but folly in 
working for what they do not want. Working for 
what other people want is a high form of altruism 
to which only a small number of Konde have risen. 
That work increases the wealth of the country is a 
doctrine of high economics which they do not under- 
stand: wealth is increased by good harvests and by 
increase of live-stock. 

The whole life of the community centres round 
the hoeing season. During the great heat which 
usually precedes the rains, the people move languidly 
about, incapable of anything like exertion. The men 
gather in groups and lie idly in the shade, talking 
languidly, droningly; an illness or a death; a 


32 Village Life 

marriage settlement; the wealth some one _ has 
brought from the South; or perhaps they exchange 
impressions of Europeans they have worked for—a 
subject into which a great deal of humour can be 
packed ; for it must not be imagined that the white 
man is taken too seriously. His little foibles, his often 
none too good temper, his haste to get a job done, 
and above all his cool assumption of unquestioned 
superiority, supply endless fun to the village joker. 
“ Bantu as she is spoke” by some Europeans gladdens 
the weary hours for many a humorously inclined 
native. 

Should the rains be late, the situation may be 
serious, for not only does the heat continue, but the 
harvest will be correspondingly late, and there is dark 
fear lest the supplies in the barns, intended to last 
until March, should have to do until April is well on. 
Public prayer is offered, led by the chief. The pre- 
liminary ceremonies have been attended to, and as 
soon as the first rains fall all sally out with the first 
streak of dawn to begin the year’s work. From a 
score of small crofts one may hear the long happy 
shout of the men, and the shrill call of the women, 
as they toil in the early morning; but as the day 
advances and the heat increases, the shouting dies 
away, and every one puts the last ounce of energy 
into the task in hand. Henceforward, for about three 
months, the native gives all his attention to his crops ; 
for as the season advances, and the grain begins to 
grow, the weeds come up also in wild profusion, and 


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Village Life a7 


sheer hard work makes men and women look thin and 
haggard. Work stops about noon; the women go 
home to attend to the food, the men to see to the 
cattle which the smaller boys have been looking after 
during the day. ‘The milking is always done by the 
men; it is not women’s work as with us. If there are 
flies about, and there usually are, the cows need no 
invitation to thrust their heads into the column of 
acrid smoke that arises from a dung fire, kindled for 
the purpose. The rest of the afternoon is filled 
either with small duties, basket mending, net work, 
some slight repairs to a canoe, rope making, house 
repairing ; or it may be there is a lawsuit to be 
settled, and every idler will make a point of being 
present. | 

By the time food is over, night has closed in. If 
the night is dark, one after another slips away with a 
friendly “‘ May you sleep well,” and silence reigns 
until morning. Unless it is suddenly broken by the 
roar of a lion or the growl of a leopard ; and then the 
young men, who sleep with the cattle, rush out with 
spears and clubs and wild shouting to drive off the 
intruder, while the others raise a weird cry within 
the houses. Should the lion take refuge in a thicket 
and refuse to be driven off, a small party may slip 
round to the nearest white man, if he is not too far 
away, to beg him either to lend them a rifle, or to 
come himself to their aid. In the warm moonlight 
nights, however, other noises fill the ear. The young 
people gather for a dance, and the drum fills the night 
air with its interminable tum tum tum, now soft and 

c 


34 Village Life 


low, again rising to a perfect fury of rapid sounds, 
not without a certain rhythm, but with rasping effect 
upon the nerves of Europeans tossing sleeplessly in 
the warm humid air. 

After harvest comes the house-building ; and when 
that is finished the men are free to go out to seek 
work. They usually set out in companies, for the 
Konde dislikes being alone on a journey. Like all 
home-loving people, they are suspicious of strangers, 
and if they have to pass through another tribe, they 
take great care to guard their small possessions ; 
seldom more than they are wearing, and a spear or a 
club to guard them from the more obvious dangers of 
the way. There will be a few youths going out for 
the first time, with a wild flutter at the heart, of fear 
and expectancy. Fear, for they have heard strange 
tales of the white men and their ways; expectancy, 
because of the wonderful things they will see: the 
great houses, steamers, trains, motors ; and what must 
seem countless white men to those who have been 
accustomed only to the missionary, the magistrate, 
and the storekeeper, and even these perhaps some 
days’ journey from home. And who knows but he will 
come back with money in his pocket, wearing gorgeous 
raiment, a helmet perhaps, and, above all other things 
to be desired, a pair of boots! Those who stay long 
come back with the spoils of civilisation; highly 
coloured cloths, cheap clocks, melodeons, mouth- 
organs, worthless pocket-knives, which they deal out 
to admiring friends and acquaintances. 


Village Life ah 


Life is never dull for the African. There are mar- 
riages and funerals here as elsewhere; the former 
always a joyous occasion, the latter not always or 
necessarily the reverse. A walk through a populous 
village will bring one upon net making, pot making, 
basket or cloth weaving, and one may hear the sharp 
tap-tap of the bark cloth worker, or, in an iron-working 
district, the clang of the blacksmith’s stone hammer, 
beating out hoes or spears upon a rough stone anvil. 
And many drive dullness away with beer. Sometimes 
it is a small party. A few friends gather in a house, 
and sit around a pot or two of beer provided by the 
wife of the host. ‘They drink to the strumming of 
a pango or the beating of a small drum, for they like 
to have music at their feasts, even when only a few 
are gathered. But if it is a village feast, given by the 
chief, it may go on all night with terrific noise, shout- 
ing, singing, and drumming ; and not always does the 
feast end without fighting. 

Sometimes the villagers receive visitors. "The native 
evangelist on his rounds is always hospitably wel- 
comed. ‘The tax collector is not exactly welcomed— 
who ever welcomes a tax collector ?—but he is received 
well enough, for his coming has at least this advantage, 
that those who are ready to pay the sum demanded 
will not have to go later and pay at the boma (magis- 
trate’s office), which may be a long distance away. 
Sometimes a native trader comes along, his packs 
carried by attendants, for he never carries them him- 
self, even when beginning on a small scale. Visitors 


36 Village Life 


of more importance are the magistrate and the mis- 
sionary, whose coming is usually heralded afar, by the 
report that he is already in the district, and is now 
perhaps only a day’s journey off, slowly making his 
way from village to village, and dealing with whatever 
matters require his attention as magistrate or mis- 
sionary. His coming is a matter of importance, for 
he will have a number of men with him who will need 
food, by the sale of which the villagers hope to make 
a few honest pence; though abundance of food 1s often 
given freely as a token of welcome. As the great man 
approaches the village, all the younger people come 
out to meet him with shouts of welcome, and if he 
is travelling in a machilla, the men will take the pole 
from the bearers, and with tremendous noise enter 
the village and deposit him at the school or the chief’s 
house. 

And the sadder side? Sickness, epidemics, the per- 
petual fear of witchcraft and of evil dreams fore- 
shadowing ill, theft with its ever-present possibility 
of accompanying murder, quarrels that will not heal, 
forced marriages, and all the hidden cruelty that so 
rarely comes to the surface. Most pathetic of all, 
perhaps, the feud between old and young; the young 
all for to-day and to-morrow, for the new ideas, the 
hope of progress; the old for yesterday with its sta- 
bility and ordered life ; the young going in crowds to 
church, the old going secretly, and no doubt sadly, to 
worship at the ancient shrines, guarding the ap- 
proaches lest the levity of youth should desecrate the 
place of terror, and evil come upon all the land; the 


Village Life 37 


young gathering around the white man, and lending 
themselves to his purposes, the old even to-day ap- 
proaching him with reluctance, if at all, for to them 
he still retains much of the awe and hidden power 
with which he was credited in the earlier days. 

The individual Konde is not so popular with white 
men as are members of other tribes ; indeed there are 
employers who will not knowingly give work to a 
Konde at all. As workmen, it must be acknowledged 
that they are both less active and less reliable than 
surrounding tribes ; they are neither so intelligent nor 
so loyal to contract. ‘The Konde soon wearies of 
effort, and longs to get back to the lowing of his cattle 
and his pretty little hut in its banana grove. He loves 
his children, and the hope of being able to clothe 
them if he works well, does not compensate him for 
prolonged absence. Loyalty, as the Henga, Angoni, 
and Yao are loyal, does not distinguish the Konde, 
who show loyalty rather to chief and to tribal custom, 
than to the white man with his problematical benefits. 
‘They have never attached themselves to the European, 
as many of the surrounding tribes have done; for the 
Konde are less convinced than others that the one hope 
of Africa is the European and his influence ; less con- 
vinced, be it added, that Africa stands so desperately 
in need of saving. ‘That may be due to their un- 
awakened condition—and, again, it may not. Edu- 
cationally, too, they are less advanced than other tribes. 
Only a few of them are to be found in Government 
offices, or doing the skilled work which commands such 
good pay from Europeans; nor have they supplied, 


38 Village Life 


in any numbers, the trained assistants in Mission work 
who form one of the principal successes of Missions 
among other tribes. 
But this does not imply that the Konde are without 
virtues. They are very shy, and respectful to authority, 
the latter a characteristic that atones for many defects 
in the minds of those who consider subserviency the 
primary virtue in a native of Africa. ‘heir conserva- 
tive nature prevents them being too free with strangers, 
and they will not greet a passing European, either until 
he takes the initiative, or until long friendship has 
convinced them that it will not be regarded as an un- 
due liberty. Once their confidence has been gained, 
they are found to be merry, laughing, and bright. 
The friendliness of children is an attractive feature of 
the tribe. And the adults are most willing to be 
friendly also, provided the first advances are made by 
the European. When one begins to know them inti- 
mately, it becomes obvious that their backwardness is 
not due to lack of capacity, but to an unyielding con- 
servatism, which leads them to think long—and some 
have been thinking for a generation—before com- 
mitting themselves to anything new. ‘“* We will think 
about it” is a common response to invitations to take 
their place alongside the more progressive tribes. Yet 
with it all they are a lovable people, responsive to 
friendliness, deeply attached to each other, and to all 
who rightly claim the name of friend. 

Slavery is, formally at least, a thing of the past. It 
is asserted by natives that some men and women are 
still in slavery, but while that is not impossible, no one 


Village Life 39 


has ever been able, or willing, to give me the name of 
either slave or owner in a single case. Yet such is the 
terrifying influence which some natives exert over 
others, that it is not difficult to believe that here and 
there throughout the country there may be individuals 
to whom continued slavery is a smaller evil than the 
wrath of an exposed owner, and therefore the fact of 
their bondage is not reported to the authorities. 
Many circumstances might combine to make the 
freeman a slave, and the slave a freeman. A man who 
led astray the wife of a chief, if discovered, paid a 
son or daughter to the husband. So also, one found 
stealing from a garden was similarly penalised. Mock- 
ing at a lame man was a crime which could only be 
atoned for by the same kind of payment; and a man 
who could not pay just debts might himself be taken 
by the creditor. Prisoners of war, it need hardly be 
added, were slaves. On the other hand, the owner 
might find himself obliged by circumstances to restore 
children so obtained ; if not, he was obliged to find 
wives or husbands for them. A slave might be a 
member of the council, and there are cases where 
slaves acquitted themselves so well in battle that they 
were granted their freedom. So long as it remained 
purely domestic, it was not an altogether intolerable 
condition. ‘There was an ex-slave living at Karonga 
not long ago, who supported as long as she lived the 
old woman who was once his owner, and that, as he 
assured me, from genuine affection. On the other 
hand, a man, not yet beyond the prime of life, was 
present when a slave was buried alive along with the 


40 Village Life 


body of his late owner. And another knew of a slave, 
bound and weighted with stones, thrown into the 
lake to feed the crocodiles. Such things may with 
reason be assumed to be impossible to-day, whether 
it be true or not that slavery still exists. 


CHAPTER III 
Konde Children 


HE small Konde boy or girl stands gazing 

with frightened eyes at the unsungu (white 

man), and the little heart can be seen beat- 

ing through the dark soft skin, while the 
breath comes and goes in rapid motion, and the tiny 
legs are ready to run at the first sign of a too near 
approach. For the white man is the bogey of the 
Konde child. From earliest infancy he has been 
taught to fear him, to regard him as a possible source 
of dreadful danger. “The white man will get you ” 
is as common a threat as its parallel of the dreadful 
black man, with which foolish people at home inflict 
injury upon their children. ‘The first impulse of a 
child in arms, approached in the most kindly fashion 
by a European, is to scream, and clasp its mother by 
the neck in an agony of fear. But once gain the con- 
fidence of these tiny black folks, and you find them as 
friendly, as delightful, as charming, as white children 
of the same age. Possibly the charming period passes 
sooner, for the Konde child begins to know good and 
evil at an age when the white man’s child is still a 
mere prattler. Little black, or rather brown, folks 
are of a quick intelligence, ready to learn, full of 

4I 


4.2 Konde Children 


romping glee ; and the musical jingle of the tiny bells 
that most of them wear on their ankles up till three 
or so is pleasant to the European, and rings with a 
thrilling response in the heart of the adoring mother, 
who sits on the ground watching the gambols of her 
little one. 

The unborn child is treated with great care, and 
surrounded with superstitions. ‘The mother must 
submit to restrictions in regard to diet, and indica- 
tions of the sex of the coming child are given by the 
preferences she shows for permitted foods. She must 
not eat hot food, for that would burn the child’s head ; 
nor beans, for they might cause the disease called 
ilyulu. An expectant mother who drinks much milk 
will bear a son ; if she has a great desire for flesh foods, 
a daughter is known to be coming. A scolding woman 
need not be surprised if her child is a boy, especially 
if her husband is the victim of her language. Some 
women will not eat rice, perhaps because it is a new 
food, all the possibilities of which have not yet been 
fully explored. 

The worst possible place for a woman to have her 
child born is at her own father’s house, unless it is 
with the consent of her husband ; for every one will 
assume that the child has an unknown father. If an 
expectant mother suspects her husband of sorcery 
she will take care to have her child born at a distance, 
so that it may not inherit its father’s undesirable 
powers, these being transmissible only at close quarters, 
and only after birth. With heathen women, the 
birth, if in the daytime, takes place mostly in the open 


Konde Children 4.3 


air, as much privacy as possible being secured in the 
universal banana groves: and always in a sitting, not 
a lying position. 

A difficult birth is a serious misfortune for the 
mother. Births are normally easy, and difficult labour 
indicates the wrath of the spirits for evil done. Medi- 
cine is in all cases given to facilitate delivery, and if 
this fails other means must be tried. A message 1s 
sent to the husband and the father of the woman, and 
prayer, without ceremony, for the matter is urgent, 
is offered by both men: 


‘‘Ye fathers and ancestors, and ye who are of 
the far past, let this child be born safely. If I have 
sinned, be merciful; and if ye will not be merciful, 
kill me, but let the woman and the child live.” 


While thus praying he has been chewing the pith of a 
banana leaf, and at the end he takes water into his 
mouth, which he squirts out, saying, ‘‘ Let my sin be 
carried away,” and throws on the roof the chewed 
pith ; for if he is not by birth the representative of 
the family he has no natural right to pray, but the 
ceremony of chewing and throwing on the roof averts 
evil consequences. 

If all this fails it is clear that the woman has sinned ; 
and her only hope of life for herself and her child 
lies in confession. The midwife takes a number of 
small sticks which she throws on the ground one by 
one, inviting the suffering woman to name the men 
with whom she has consorted. Natives assert em- 
phatically that birth becomes easier after confession ; 


44 Konde Children 


and the statement cannot be altogether devoid of 
truth. ‘The influence of the mind upon the body is 
universally admitted: may it not be that the con- 
sciousness of guilt has the effect of contracting the 
muscles, and the relaxation which follows confession 
renders birth less painful? And may it not be that 
even a false confession, wrung from a despairing 
sufferer, brings a momentary relief sufficient to bring 
the child to the birth? One is glad to add, however, © 
that many women have the courage to refuse altogether 
to submit to this shameful ordeal, insisting that their 
trouble is due, not to the wrath of the spirits, but to 
other causes, and that they will die rather than confess 
what is not true. 

When birth has taken place, the cord is cut with a 
bamboo knife, and the placenta buried in the family 
place of prayer, a small part protruding to leave a con- 
nection which insures further children. All this time 
no one in the house may swallow saliva. ‘The father 
calls out to know the sex of the child, but he must not 
yet enter (for the party have entered the house as 
soon as possible after the birth). After a few days 
the mother is anointed with oil and shaved, along with 
her child, and powdered with medicine. Meantime 
intimation has been sent to the grandparents ; a cock 
if a boy, a hen if a girl, telling them all that they wish 
to know. ‘The mother may now resume her household 
duties. 

But in about a week she goes to show the child to 
her own parents, and at the end of her visit, which 
lasts some weeks, great preparations are made by both 


Konde Children 4.5 


sets of grandparents. ‘lhe mother sets out from her 
father’s house with a train of friends carrying food, 
and a very special friend who carries the baby. Arrived 
at the paternal grandfather’s, the food is laid down, 
and the child is taken by the grandfather, who pre- 
sents a hoe to the maternal grandmother ; and then, 
with the child in his arms, goes to the zkiyinja (the 
family place of prayer). He spits into the palm of 
his hand, and, laying it in blessing upon the child’s 
head, he prays : 


“¢ May it be well with you, my child. Ye spirits, 
be not surprised at this child of yours whom I pre- 
sent to you. I am old: let him take my place. 
Care for him in this world of sickness. I was alone, 
and ye have multiplied me and made me a company. 
Be not angry, but bless the child ; and in the sight 
of God let him be acceptable.” 


‘The mother sits with head covered, for she must 
not be seen by her father-in-law. ‘The parties now 
exchange gifts of food, and eat separately, after 
which the grandfather gives the child a gift, usually 
now a small coin, over which the little hand is closed. 
Next, the grandmother takes the infant and hands it 
to its mother, who, with a pot of beer on her head, 
goes off with her husband to their home. Arrived 
there, but not till then, the father takes the child in 
his arms, and thanks it for the gift it has brought, a 
foretoken of more yet to be earned. 

Lingering here and there in certain families are 
strange customs, probably belated survivals from 


46 Konde Children 


earlier days. The family of Lugulu at Mwakeleli wear 
blinders of leaves for weeks after a birth. At the end 
of the period a feast of beer and ill-cooked food 1s 
prepared, and both sets of families spend the night in 
open reviling of each other, and ceaseless tramping of 
the feet the livelong night. In the morning good food 
is eaten, and both parties go their ways with mutual 
good will. This is called ukutila indila, to fear the 
fears; to endure the terrors. No explanation of what 
the terrors are has reached me. 

The birth of twins is regarded as one of the greatest 
of misfortunes, and is followed by ceremonies intended 
to cleanse the parents from the stain which has come 
upon them, and to prevent its spread to others. A 
hut is built outside the village, with a partition in the 
middle, on either side of which the parents live, but 
they must speak to each other only in whispers, and 
to others not at all. The doctor sprinkles all the 
relatives with medicine, and kindles a fire, in the smoke 
of which every one must stand for a moment. ‘The 
parents are shut up in the hut, but may leave it for a 
few moments at night, and no one may see them. 
After about a month the doctor comes again, with 
beating drums and shaking rattle, and brings the 
parents out of their house of restraint. A second 
sprinkling of medicine upon each relative being made, 
the doctor takes a bunch of grass from the roof, 
kindles it, and hands it to the father, who, holding it 
in one hand, crawls out of the house, and runs, followed 
by the crowd. He returns, however, and receives their 


Konde Children 47 


salutations with his hand upon his mouth. Beer mixed 
with medicine is handed to him, and, all the others 
drinking one by one from a calabash, he takes a little 
into his mouth and squirts it upon each as he or she 
drinks. ‘The final stage comes about a month later, 
when, in the presence of the doctor, without whom 
nothing can be done, all the grandparents and both 
parents drink beer amid a circle of shouting villagers, 
and then, laying hold of the calabash, break it in 
pieces. After one more sprinkling of all, the doctor 
departs, taking with him a cow as fee for his many 
exertions. But until another child is born, the parents 
must eat alone, or with other parents of twins; and 
the mother may not pass behind anyone without warn- 
ing them and receiving their consent, signified by 
clapping the hands. 

The naming of the child. The Konde child pos- 
sesses a varied selection of names. When he is grown 
he will offer a European employer one or another, 
sometimes in perfect honesty, sometimes with intent 
to hide the fact that under a previously given name he 
had a bad character. But the names are all genuine. 
Descent is through the father, and the new-born child 
takes the personal name of its paternal grandfather, 
let us say Ambangire. But his mother must never 
refer to her father-in-law by name, nor may she use 
the name in referring to any other person who bears 
it; her son therefore takes her own name; if she is 
called Kalukwa, he will be named Mwakalukwa; next he 
takes the family name of his father, say Mwakasungula. 


48 Konde Children 


He is now Ambangire Mwakalukwa Mwakasungula ; 
but his mother usually has a pet name for him, 
which no one else uses; and, finally, at marriage he 
takes yet another name, used only by his wife. But 
only one name is used at a time. When the personal 
name, Ambangire, is used, he is among familiar friends ; 
when he is called Mwakalukwa he is being referred 
to as his mother’s son; and when it is desired to 
honour or humour him he is given his title of 
Mwakasungula. 

Girls take the personal name of the paternal grand- 
mother, but are sometimes referred to by their father’s 
family name. 

For boys, the work of life begins at about five. It 
is a greatly longed-for promotion, for at that age many 
of them go out with the bigger boys to herd the village 
cattle. One may see almost anywhere a couple of 
infants, with long sticks, looking after herds of fifteen 
to twenty head of cattle, and having a thoroughly 
good time of it. In the low-lying plains they do not 
begin till they are eight, for there the grass is longer, 
and the ever-present dangers of the bush are more 
difficult to guard against. ‘The boys, big and little, 
get together in groups, and there is no kind of evil 
that growing boys can learn that they do not learn 
during that period ; but they learn also much that is 
good, and useful in after life. About eight to ten 
thousand children of all ages attend the Mission schools, 
but with many attendance is spasmodic, and the great 
school of life is the bush. ‘The majority of parents 
follow the educational principles of Mr. Samuel 


Konde Children 40 


Weller, senior, and turn their children out into the 
bush to learn whatever the companions they find there 
have to teach them. 

They play at “ grown-ups,” having their own chiefs 
and headmen ; build houses, pay taxes, learn various 
useful and many injurious things. ‘Their “ chiefs ” 
demand taxes, and there is no pretence about it. A 
boy must steal, even if it be from his own parents, what- 
ever his chief wants, and pay it to him as tax. More 
serious thieving is often attempted, and the chief, 
who is usually the biggest bully of the crowd, will 
bring to trial and punishment the very boys whom he 
sent out to steal. Mimic battles are fought in good 
temper, but they sometimes end in serious injury to 
some of the warriors. ‘The great achievement which 
all boys burn to excel in is the high leap, and a thrash- 
ing may be the portion of the unlucky one who is 
weakest. ‘Tricks of many kinds are indulged in, one 
of the favourites being to send a mere child off on some ° 
errand, and on his return direct him to sit in a place 
where a fire has been kindled, and the ashes removed 
in his absence ; or he is ordered to sit where thorns 
have been placed for him. No boy dares to disobey 
such orders. 

Mimicry is a favourite amusement. I have seen 
remarkably good imitations of motor-bicycles made by 
quite small boys, even the “ phut-phut ” being repro- 
duced by another boy running along with a bent reed 
touching the ground. Lanterns are made out of 
pumpkins, as boys at home make turnip lanterns. 


Hats and shoes are fashioned out of leaves, and tiny 
D 


50 Konde Children 


canoes of maize leaves are sent floating down stream, 
with shouting and racing competition between the 
owners. 

Girls help their mothers, and at a very early age look 
after their younger brothers or sisters. It is a common 
sight to see a small girl staggering along under weight 
of a fat baby brother strapped to her back. 

In the hotter regions boys go naked till ten or 
twelve, wearing nothing but a piece of string on the 
waist and a charm on neck or wrist. Girls begin to 
wear bark-cloth waistbands at five or six, adding more 
as circumstances permit. ‘Their clothing is provided 
by the father; but boys, at whatever age they begin 
to wear any kind of garment, have to earn it for them- 
selves, for it is not the business of their fathers to 
clothe them. They often, however, get a fowl or two, 
or even a goat or a sheep, from a grandparent, with 
the proceeds of which they buy a yard or two of 
cloth. 

In the great majority of families there is a cruel 
difference in the treatment of boys and girls. The 
boys are uncared for, dirty, unoiled, not too well 
fed; while the girls are kept clean and oiled, well fed, 
and as far as possible clothed at an early age. Live 
reason is not far to seek. Girls are a source of wealth, 
and a dirty, ill-cared-for girl will command few head 
of cattle when the time comes to think of her marriage. 
Boys, on the other hand, have value only as repre- 
sentatives of the family when the father has passed to 
the spirit world, and that value is not dependent on 
external circumstances. A change is being effected, 


Konde Children St 


however, by the fact that, in the neighbourhood of 
Europeans, boys can earn money, and so help the 
family exchequer. 

Puberty is reached at about fifteen, and boys pass 
that stage without ceremony. Girls are segregated, 
usually in groups. ‘They lie on leaves spread on the 
floor, and must not be seen by boys, unless they are 
the daughters of chiefs, who are permitted to see boys 
at night. The initiate receives instruction, usually 
from her mother, though there are plenty of willing 
advisers besides, in household matters. When this is 
over, the wife of the mfusya (the man who was go- 
between at her parents’ marriage) comes, with others, 
to inquire about the girl’s character, to which a 
favourable answer is given by the mother: she cooks 
for strangers, has never known a man, and is of good 
temper. ‘l’hen she is examined, and if she is found 
to be impure (as she is ; there is practically no excep- 
tion), she is put up into the rafters, where she is half- 
choked in the fumes of a smoky fire specially kindled. 
Here she remains until permitted to come down, a 
severe beating following upon any attempt to escape. 
(The cleansing power of smoke is to be noted also in 
connection with twins.) ‘The children of Christian 
parents are examined in the same way. Happily the 
situation is improving, though very slowly. After 
being thoroughly smoked, the girl is washed and oiled, 
and the banyago (older women) come to instruct her 
in all her duties to husband and children when she 
has them. 

Immediately after the initiation rites the betrothal 


52 Konde Children 


ceremonies begin; indeed, the one passes into the 
other. Girls are sometimes betrothed before birth, 
but this is usually done only when a wife has died, 
and the father, being obliged to supply another, offers 
the widower the next child to be born if it is a girl. 
He sends a boy to the man as a guarantee of good 
faith, but the boy remains only a week or so, and then 
returns to his home. 

It may be accepted as certain that no boy comes 
through the dangers of adolescence unharmed. Fathers 
are said to warn their growing sons about these dangers, 
and sometimes they threaten to refuse to find wives 
for them if the warning goes unheeded ; but nothing 
more is done, and the threat is never carried out. 

Children’s games are much too numerous for any- 
thing but a mere reference. For quiet moments, 
puzzles ; or guessing what is in the hand of another ; 
or what object, out of sight, is being touched. A 
favourite river- or lake-side sport is diving and staying 
under water while some one counts. Walking on the 
hands or on stilts is very popular. 

Yangilo is a ball game, with sides, the ball being 
thrown from one to another on the same side, while 
the other side endeavours to get and keep it a given 
number of throws, without letting it fall to the ground 
or into the hands of the opponents. Jnguba is a game 
not unlike our hockey, a ball being struck about, and 
kept as far as possible within one’s own side. Negulya 
is played with sides sitting at a distance from a small 
object set up in the middle, while any round thing 
is thrown at it from side to side, the winning side 


Konde Children 53 


being the one that hits the object a given number of 
times in succession. 

Ingaramu, the lion, is a piece of banana cord at- 
tached to a string and whirled round the head, when 
it makes a noise remotely resembling the growling of 
a lion. Jfula, rain, is our bull-roarer; old people 
still believe that it stops the rain ; but even they admit 
that no well-disposed spirit takes any notice of child’s 
play. Bandu is a kind of top, spun by twirling it 
between the palms and letting it go. Whip-tops are 
in use, but are of European origin. A kind of mimic 
ammunition is supplied by the seeds of the wasyunguti 
tree, which are thrown at the enemy, and all who are 
hit are ‘‘ killed,’ and carried off the field. 

Konde children are perfectly happy. Those who 
go to school hail the dismissal hour with the same 
shouts of joy as little people at home. The boys will 
climb a tree perhaps, with the more glee if the teacher’s 
prohibition has added a whiff of danger to the exploit. 
Or they will chase an unfortunate goat around ; 
though the goat, having been handled from earliest 
kidhood very much as we handle pet dogs, probably 
enjoys the sport as much as the boys do. A couple of 
boys may get astride a young bullock, and go careering 
along the road; or more likely the whole troop will 
make a rush for the nearest water in river or lake, and 
with terrific noise splash about in joyous excitement. 
No doubt those who are utterly unclad look with 
envy on the scraps of clothing worn by their more 
fortunate fellows, but that does not silence the shout 
of glee which fills the air as boys and girls are let loose 


54 Konde Children 


from school. Where there is no school there is not 
the joy of being “let out ” ; but other joys exist, for 
the Konde child is just as much an adept at finding 
outlets for his energy as European children are when 


left to themselves. 


GHAELERVIV. 
Husband & Wife 


OES the African buy his wife? The 
answer must be ambiguous, because the 
situation is so. I put the question to two 
highly educated natives, and both, inde- 

pendently, gave an immediate and emphatic “‘ Yes.” 
I put it to some elderly men of no education at all in 
our sense of the term, and they indignantly answered 
‘““No.” ‘There are, too, educated Africans, of many 
tribes, who resent as an outrage the suggestion of 
purchase. And wives, whatever the implication may 
be, take pride in the number of cattle paid for them, 
much as a girl at home might regard with satisfaction 
the amount of dowry she brought to the common 
purse. Some years ago a bride went to her husband, 
with the full consent of her father, no cattle, or any 
other goods, having been given for her, but the ex- 
periment was disastrous. ‘he other married women 
regarded her with contempt, as a person of no con- 
sideration. A most unhappy life followed, and in a 
very short time the home was broken up. Such an 
attitude, however, is obviously not permanent. ‘The 
Christians of the ‘Tonga tribe gave up, some time ago, 
the whole custom, with, I understand, no evil results. 

No Konde youth can get a wife if he, or his family 

55 


56 Husband & Wife 


on his behalf, cannot find the requisite number of 
cattle to hand over to the relatives of the bride; but 
the idea of purchase is not present to the minds of 
any of the numerous relatives on both sides who take 
part in the discussion ; and in point of fact nothing 
corresponding to our idea of purchase takes place. 
The wife is in no sense a slave. She belongs to her 
husband only in the sense in which the wife of a white 
man belongs to him. ‘The cattle are, indeed, a guid 
pro quo, for the man who has got a wife has got a good 
thing, and it is, say the Konde, right that the parents, 
who had all the trouble of bringing his wife up for him, 
should get some return for their toil. The father, in 
receiving the cattle, guarantees the conduct of his 
daughter in all that is expected of a wife, but in 
nothing that is expected of a slave. She is not a 
chattel, as our own laws once declared a wife to be. 
If she goes astray, the cattle, with the increase, are 
returned to the husband. On the other hand, if the 
husband is divorced, he will not get back all the cattle 
when his wife leaves him. ‘The father and brothers 
retain always the rights of guardianship, and may 
remove the wife if they think it necessary to do so, 
the number of cattle, if any, to be returned being 
decided in open discussion. But if the marriage takes 
place, as it often does, before the whole of the goods 
have been handed over, the first daughter goes to the 
maternal grandfather or his heirs, and if she reaches 
marriageable age before the full amount has been 
paid, the cattle for her marriage belong, not to her 
father, but to her maternal grandfather. 


Husband & Wife 57 


Even apart from the question of payment, a native 
marriage is a complicated business, involving prolonged 
negotiations ; inquiries into the character and health 
of the parties, the prospects of the young man, the 
proposed place of residence, the quality of the gardens, 
and many other considerations, which are seriously 
gone into. 

The first formal approach to the girl is made by a 
friend of the boy; but as this is bad form, it is after- 
wards denied. Next, a neighbour of the girl’s father 
is visited. 

“My friend here,” says the mfusya (go-between), 
““ needs some one to carry water for him.” 

“There is no one here to carry water for him,” 
says the neighbour. 

“O yes, there is,” comes the reply ; “ the daughter 
of so-and-so would do very well.” 

The father of the girl is now visited by the whole 
party, and gives a non-committal consent, receiving a 
hoe as a token that negotiations have begun. Next 
day a council of the whole family discusses the pro- 
posal, and decides the number of cattle to be paid if 
everything else is satisfactory, with the pleasant pros- 
pect of a feast in the evening. ‘The bridegroom and 
his friends then bring the first of the cattle, usually 
only one at this stage. The young men are oiled, 
painted, or adorned with leaves and flowers, and ap- 
proach the bride’s home at a run, leaping and shouting, 
and waving spears or clubs. The go-between lays on 
the ground a spear and a hoe, and invites the girl to 
come and take them. If she does so she signifies her 


58 Husband & Wife 


consent to the marriage, but it should be noted that 
she has the right of refusal, though it is seldom exer- 
cised. 'I'wo brides recently refused in church (they 
were both Christians) to marry the men who stood 
beside them ; and a young girl a few months ago was 
with difficulty rescued from a hateful marriage, and 
is now pluckily living her own life, rather than submit 
to the unsavoury fate which her guardians had ordained 
for her. In case of refusal, however, the father may 
wash his hands of the whole matter, and decline to 
take any steps to find another husband for his dis- 
obedient daughter. 

To return, the girl takes the hoe, and with the haft 
smites the cow which is standing there, in token that 
she accepts the obligations which the payment of the 
cattle involves. ‘Then she lifts the spear, and hands 
it to her father, saying, “‘ Slay me with this spear if I 
am unfaithful to my husband ” ; and the father, with 
a grim assurance that he will not fail, lays up the 
spear in the house, where it will be seen by the ancestral 
spirits. 

About a week after the feast which follows, the 
bride, with one girl friend, and a “ mother,” but not 
the mother who bore her, goes to the house of the 
go-between, who gives the mother a fowl, and the 
bride a piece of bark-cloth, and leads them to the 
husband’s house. With a gift from the husband, the 
mother now retires, and a succession of small gifts 
induces the bride to take up her duties: a fowl per- 
suades her to enter the house; some other gift, 
probably a few cents, induces her to kindle a fire, a 


Husband & Wife 59 


third to cook food, and a final gift is required to make 
her lie down on the mat along with her girl friend, 
who stays with her for a few days. This ceremony of 
the gifts is never omitted in heathen marriages, and 
each successively binds the girl to her husband. 

If the bride is a twin, the doctor must be present, to 
sprinkle medicines over house and bedding, and to 
give the couple a decoction supposed to prevent the 
occurrence of twins in the new family. 

Except the daughters of Christian parents, all 
Konde girls are married before they arrive at puberty, 
and what has been described above applies to child 
wives, who stay with their husbands for about a month, 
and then go home. 

The child wife having grown to womanhood, how- 
ever, further ceremonies have to be observed. ‘The 
husband arrives at her father’s house with an ox for 
the feast, and a mock struggle for possession of the 
bride takes place. ‘he women of her family barricade 
themselves in the house, which is attacked by the 
women of the other family. Payment of a shilling 
opens the door, and the further struggle which takes 
place in the house is brought to an end by the formal 
presentation of the ox. The husband and his friends 
enter, and engage in a weird dance, a mere tramping 
of the floor in unison, with shouting and waving of 
spears, no doubt a survival of what was once marriage 
by capture. 

The washing and shaving of the bride follows, and 
her bark-cloth is burned, and a new one given her, and 
then comes the feast of beef and beer, the materials 


60 Husband & Wife 


for the latter having been previously collected from 
house to house, with a snatch of song at each door. 
After the feast the bride goes in procession to her 
husband’s house, accompanied by a number of girl 
friends. The happy couple are chased along the road, 
beaten with sticks as they go, and advised to treat each 
other as becomes husband and wife. At the door of 
her future home a final ceremony has to be performed : 
the wife of the go-between pours water over the hus- 
band’s hands, and the bride, kneeling at his feet, 
receives the water as it falls, and washes her own hands 
therewith. 

There are strict rules regarding selection. A man 
may not take a wife from the family either of his 
father or of his mother, using the word “ family ” in 
the native sense, implying the whole circle of relatives 
from which each originally came. But there are 
countless bye-laws. A man has two wives from dif- 
ferent families; the son of one wife may take a wife 
from the family of the other, the two families not 
being related ; but a man may not marry the daughter 
of his paternal uncle, for the latter is his “ father,” 
and the girl is his “sister.” ‘The daughter of his 
maternal uncle, again, is his cousin, and he may not 
marry her, though there is nothing to hinder his father 
marrying her. ‘The chief Koloso married his father’s 
sister, to the great scandal of his people, although the 
‘ father ” was really a very distant relative, according 
to European ideas. 

The marriage tie is sacred and binding ; how bind- 
ing on the wife may be judged from the laying up of 


Husband & Wife 61 


the spear which is to slay her if she disregards it. The 
injured husband, too, has the right to inflict death 
upon the paramour. ‘This is no mere tale of the past, 
but a grim fact of to-day. Just a very short time ago, 
two of my workmen asked a day’s leave of absence to 
go and bury a relative who had suffered the extreme 
penalty at the hands of an outraged husband. Cases 
of this nature are very numerous, and are necessarily 
treated by British law as murder ; but native law still 
looks upon them as a just reprisal by the husband. 

Divorce is granted only for approved reasons. ‘The 
husband, when he believes he has ground for divorce, 
requests his go-between to take up the case; but the 
latter will do so only if he is satisfied that the evidence 
is sufficient to secure a verdict in his client’s favour. 
‘The woman’s father fixes a day for the public hearing 
of the case, himself as judge, for there is an appeal to 
the chief only if either party is dissatisfied with the 
decision arrived at. ‘The finding of the court is in all 
cases reported to the chief. 

‘he commonest cause is unfaithfulness of the wife, 
which being proved or admitted, there is no further 
discussion, although the trouble is sometimes patched 
up by the gift of a cow to the husband. Ifa wife has 
conceived, and does not tell her husband, it is a very 
grave matter indeed, for she is assumed to be trying 
to hide from him what is not his, and an action for 
divorce may follow. Barrenness, if known to be of 
the wife, is a cause of divorce; but not seldom the 
wife retorts the charge upon her husband, and cases 
are not unknown where, by mutual agreement, both 


62 Husband & Wite 


parties brought the dispute to the test of intercourse 
with others. Again, if daughters die one after 
another, their death is assumed to be due to the 
disease called kitasya in the mother, and she is 
divorced. A wife who goes out in the morning while 
her husband is still abed, is doing a very foolish thing, 
for there is at least the possibility that she 1s pro- 
viding ground for divorce. General laziness and use- 
lessness, inability or refusal to carry out the ordinary 
household duties, if persisted in, lead to divorce. 

On the other hand, while ordinary unfaithfulness 
in the husband gives the wife no ground for an 
appeal for divorce, no woman will tolerate incest by 
her husband, but will demand instant release. Beating 
a wife and starving her will bring down father or 
brothers in wrath to demand the release of their 
ward; but beating alone only if merciless and per- 
sistent. ‘The right of a husband to beat his wife 
within reason is not questioned. ‘There are other 
grounds on which the wife may claim divorce, and 
also the husband, but in both cases they are such as 
cannot appear in print. 

When a husband’s demand for divorce has been 
granted, all the cattle given to the woman’s father 
are returned, along with the increase which has taken 
place. British justice, with more fairness, deducts 
one-fifth or one-quarter of the number of cattle (plus 
increase) for each child born, the remainder going 
back to the husband. ‘The children belong to the 
father, to whom belong also children unborn or too 
young to leave the mother. When the time comes, 


Husband & Wife 63 


he takes such children away, leaving a cow as payment 
to his late wife for bringing them up. The frantic 
appeals of the mother, when her child is being taken 
away from her, make a most distressing scene. I 
have been implored by mothers, kneeling at my feet, 
or rolling on the ground in agony, to intercede for 
them ; but native and British law here coincide, and, 
apart from an appeal to the husband to forego his 
rights, nothing can be done. And any interference is 
inadvisable for the child’s own sake, for there is 
reason to suspect that fathers deprived of what they 
consider their rights, take measures quietly to put 
the children to death. In the past the acknowledged 
child of adultery was openly put to death; to-day 
the husband may claim it if it is a girl, for a girl is 
“cattle”; but a boy he, in most cases, entirely 
ignores. 

There is formally no limit to the number of wives 
a man may have, except the limit of his ability to part 
with cattle. But while polygamy was always lawful, 
it was not always expedient: warriors were often 
monogamous in practice until they reached an age 
when but little fighting was likely to be expected of 
them. And there were always men who never had 
more than one wife, two being a very common 
number for others. While there is a sentiment 
among’some women in favour of monogamy, it is a 
very slow growth. ‘There are women who will not 
marry Christians, because the wife of a Christian, 
being alone, has to do all the work, whereas in the 
other case, many wives make light work for each. 


64 Husband & Wife 


There are a few heathen women who do not wish 
their husbands to take other wives, but many who 
urge them to do so. Another wife is like a servant in 
the house, and the position of the principal wife (who 
is not necessarily the first) is improved when her 
husband adds to the number of her more or less 
obedient juniors. Formally they are her sisters; in 
reality they are her servants, and must always answer 
tact Phe 


husband also gains in-importance as he acquires one 


her demands with the polite response “ 


wife after another. When the children are grown up, 
they are dispersed to various villages, and the father 
is always ‘“‘ feared” in such places, because he has 
sons or daughters who will see to it that he is properly 
honoured when he pays them a visit. 

Husband and wife take new names at marriage ; 
but they are for private use only, the old names being 
used by their friends. ‘The new names, which are 
given in the presence of witnesses, indicate that the 
old life is past, and that new duties and privileges 
now bind the couple to each other. 

The position of the wife is guarded in many ways. 
Her father and brothers are always ready to take up 
her quarrel, even to the extent of fighting her husband 
if need be. She owns property, but she retains it 
only so long as she is a wife: divorce separates her 
from husband and children, and also from all the 
household goods of which she is otherwise mistress. 
The husband hoes the garden, but the produce 
belongs to the wife ; he may not take anything with- 
out her consent, even to feed his friends. If one wife 


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Husband & Wife 65 


refuses point blank to feed his visitors, he appeals to 
another; but it will be obvious that continued 
churlishness on the part of a wife would lead to 
trowble. Bananas, rice, and malesi belong to the 
husband ; bananas, because he alone attends to them ; 
rice, because it came from the Europeans ; and malesi, 
because from this cereal beer is made, and the husband 
is lord of the beer pot once the beer is brewed. Fowls 
belong to the wife, but though the profits of sale are 
hers, she usually lays them out in small household 
necessities, such as salt. She often gets a cow from 
her father, and her husband may make her a similar 
gift; and he must not use the milk without her 
consent, though if it is sold, the money is laid by to 
pay the tax. All household utensils are hers, except 
the small dish from which her husband eats ; but she 
leaves everything behind should she be divorced, 
except the cow she received from her father. 

If a wife dies while still capable of child-bearing, 
her father must give another daughter to the widower ; 
or, if he has none, a cow, dressed with flowers, is sent 
with an apology, and a promise that as soon as possible 
the dowry cattle will be returned. If the father 
hopes that another daughter may yet be born to him, 
an arrangement may be come to by which she will go 
to the widower. Widows become the “ family” of 
the heir. ‘They wear anklets of cow-skin, and let 
their hair grow, mixing it with clay. ‘These signs of 
mourning they wear for about a year. Girls wear 
similar tokens of mourning if either parent is dead, 


but not boys. 
E 


66 Husband & Wife 


The dowry cattle are usually found by the father of 
the bridegroom; if he does not own them himself, 
the boy’s uncles come to his aid ; and in the event of 
divorce, they are re-distributed, with the increase, in 
the proportion in which each contributed. The father 
of the bride, who receives the cattle, as a rule divides 
them among his relatives, one going, in the case 
of the first daughter to be married, to the village 
headman. 

It is usual to commiserate the sad lot of the African 
wife. I am not sure that much commiseration is 
called for. If the husband converts his duties of 
natural guardian into those of oppressor, he will 
answer to her father and brothers. As I have indi- 
cated, she owns property in a small measure; she is 
mistress in her own house ; even her husband seldom 
interferes with her decisions, and no one else ever 
does. She has to work hard, it is true, working up 
till old age at tasks that would quickly kill a European 
woman. But she is not unhappy; indeed one sees 
more happy faces among them than unhappy; and 
she is blessed beyond imagination in comparison with 
the horrible conditions in which some women in our 
own country lived during the earlier part of the 
Industrial Revolution ; and large numbers of them 
are happy in their husbands and children. Although 
many girls are married before they know what is 
happening to them, and many are unhappily yoked, 
as revealed by the great numbers who run away later 
with young men of their own age; yet there are 
countless happy families, where deep affection binds 


Husband & Wife 67 


husband and wife by strong ties ; and where a possi- 
bility of parting faces them, as in the case of men 
wishing to join the Christian Church, and so having 
to put away all wives except the first, it brings with 
it im very many cases a pain, keen and poignant, such 
as one might imagine would be felt by Europeans in 
similar circumstances. I know not a few cases where 
a young husband and wife began their married life by 
serious quarrelling; but after a while not only 
became reconciled, but discovered that something had 
happened to them not unlike falling in love with each 
other. And, while there are too many instances of 
the opposite, it is further true that at least in the 
presence of strangers, husband and wife treat each 
other with a mutual courtesy and dignity, which 
would form no inappropriate model for peoples of 
higher development. 


CHAPTER V 


The Chief & his Counsellors 
HE Chungu of to-day is but a poor shadow 


of his great ancestors. European power 
has deprived him of many of his preroga- 
tives, and stripped his person and his office 
of much that was picturesque, and might well have 
been preserved. But even in the heyday of their 
glory, the Chungus were but priest-kings, hampered 
in their divinity, hedged in their kingship by advisers, 
limitations, customs, which could not be set aside. 
‘To-day Chungu is but one chief among many ; but 
in the past chiefs of all ranks in the Karonga district 
were subject to him; acknowledging his superiority, 
but yet asserting for themselves a considerable amount 
of independence, even to the extent of making war. 
First are the chiefs proper, chiefs of the snake, so 
called because their insignia of office is a buffalo or 
zebra tail, in which is a powerful medicine made from 
the flesh of a fabulous flying serpent, and which is 
believed to give its possessor great influence and 
authority. Next in rank, and subordinate to chiefs, 
are the amafumu, men who possess a less powerful 
medicine; and finally men of still less importance, 
who exercise a strictly local authority. 
Chunegu himself, however, was, and still is, “* the 


man who speaks with God”; and as such he is 
68 


The Chief & his Counsellors 69 


hedged with a real divinity, which the limitations to 
which he has to submit, and the independence of the 
once-subordinate chiefs, have not yet destroyed. He 
remains pre-eminently the man of prayer, who carries 
to the ancestral spirits the petitions of the community, 
and speaks to them with an authority which no other 
possesses. 

Far excelling in power and authority even the 
greatest of the chiefs were, and, shorn of much of 
their glory are, the amakambara, the councillors of 
Chungu. ‘These men are in many cases chiefs of high 
rank, but even when they are not so, their position 
endows them with great influence and authority. 
The principal duties of the councillors were to put 
the reigning Chungu to death when he became seriously 
ill, a duty which has necessarily lapsed under British 
tule; to select, with the help of divination, his 
successor; to instruct him in his duties, to advise 
him in all matters which demand decision; and to 
depose him if he is unsatisfactory. 

The health of the priest-king and the welfare of 
the whole community were inseparably bound up 
together. A Chungu in health and vigour meant a 
land yielding its fruits, rain coming in its season, evil 
averted. But a weak and ailing Chungu meant 
disasters of many kinds. Smaller illnesses Chungu, 
very excusably, concealed from his councillors, hoping 
that his ancestors would hear the prayers which he 
offered secretly by night. But when serious illness 
overtook him, the councillors were called to a full 
meeting by those who were about the person of the 


70 The Chief & his Counsellors 


chief. For Chungu must not die a natural death ; 
the land would be turned into water should such a 
calamity be allowed to happen. Having decided that 
the illness is really grave, the councillors, one by one, | 
give their voice in the formula, “Siku na mwaka,” 
literally, day and year ; but actually meaning, “ Does 
God die?” In solemn procession these terrible 
persons enter the house, and, having turned out the 
chief’s wives, lay him down on the floor. ‘Two keep 
him in that posture, while a third stops his breath by 
holding his mouth and nostrils, a fourth meanwhile 
gently slapping him all over the body until the life 
has gone out of him. 

No announcement of the death was made. One of 
the councillors lived in the royal dwelling, so that if 
any came to consult Chungu a response might be 
given, and as he was rarely seen by common men, it 
was easy to keep up the deception. The councillors 
with their own hands digged the grave, and on their 
shoulders, at midnight, carried the body, anointed 
with lion fat, and enswathed in cloth, to the place of 
burial. Six or eight slaves, who did not return, went 
with them. Four went down into the grave to receive 
the body of their dead master, two at the head and 
two at the feet, and, in sitting position, held him in 
their arms. The remaining slaves being placed on the 
top, the soil was filled in on living and dead. 

After the lapse of about a month, a big iron drum, 
now lost, was beaten, and it conveyed only one 
message to the people. “ Kutebite ku Mphande,” 
Mphande (the royal residence) has done its work ; 


The Chief & his Counsellors 71 


Chungu is dead. Then the chiefs and their men, 
fully armed, gathered to the mourning. Weeping 
there was none, for Chungu must not be wept for ; 
and women were not present, for the mourning 
for Chungu is war; quarrels may break out among 
the men, and there may be many deaths before 
the mourning is over. The chiefs bring oxen for the 
feast, and gifts of ivory to be laid up in the house 
where Chungu goes to pray when he prays alone. 

The councillors now address themselves to the task 
of selecting a successor. ‘There are no candidates ; 
for not only must Chungu himself be helped out of 
the world, but all his sons, born after his accession, 
are put to death at birth. Daughters are allowed to 
live, and sons born before their father attained to the 
chief dignity, are not under the ban. Here again 
British rule steps in, but British rule has not yet been 
able to sweep all fear of the past out of the minds of 
the people. From among the Bakerenge, a circle of 
families within which the new Chungu must be 
found, name after name is presented to the spirits by 
the diviner, and when the divining rod indicates that 
the right name has been presented, the formula is 
uttered, “Abapasi bittke,” the underworld has spoken. 

At a great feast, at which all men of royal blood 
must be present, Mulwa, one of the councillors, by 
hereditary right ofters prayer to the spirits, as if the 
selection had not already been made: 


“Ve chiefs, we pray you to show us our lord, 
who shall be our leader in all things. Let him be 
the man of your appointing, not of our desire ; to 


72 The Chief & his Counsellors 


whom all the land shall look; who shall go to the 

holy place to pray for us, who shall guard the 

sacred objects of lordship. Let him be our food 

and our shield; let his name be safety for all. I 

pray to you, chiefs of the past, ye who kill or save 

alive.” 

Mulwa, carrying in his hand the “ rod of lordship,” 
stands out and looks around on the assembled chiefs. 
Suddenly he throws the rod at the man selected. 
Immediately he is seized, with a shout of triumph, 
‘“‘ He is our food and our shield.” ‘he wailing of his 
female relatives, who weep as for a dead man, is 
drowned in the shouting and drumming with which 
the new Chungu is brought to the sacred house, 
where he is anointed with lion fat, and seated on the 
lion skins with which the house is carpeted. In this 
house are kept all the objects of which he is guardian, 
the tails of eland, zebra, buffalo, elephant, containing 
the medicine made from the body of the great snake 
inyifwira ; skins and heads of lions; ivory, cloth, 
and the rod of lordship. 

After about three months of strict seclusion, 
during which his health is carefully noted, lest, being 
a weakling, he should be a menace to the land, the 
new ruler is brought to the dwelling which in the 
meantime has been built for him, and his reign is 
fairly begun. 

The person of Chungu was regarded with extra- 
ordinary reverence. He was not approached by the 
common people, who were not allowed even to 
see the man who speaks with God. An immense 


The Chief & his Counsellors 73 


enclosure surrounded his dwelling of many houses, 
where he lived with his wives and slaves, and, always 
present, some of his councillors. [he arrival of 
visitors was announced by the young men who kept 
the gates; but only visitors of very high standing 
were actually admitted to the presence of the chief. 
If Chungu left the enclosure wearing his crown of 
black cloth with long streamers, the people hid them- 
selves. When he went on a journey, the older people 
claimed the right of seeing him, and even saluting 
him as he passed; the younger were rigorously kept 
out of the way. When he crossed a river the men who 
carried him must not allow his feet to touch water, 
which he himself must never touch with his foot, 
for a flood would follow which would do much 
damage to the country. 

To maintain his dignity, the chief received taxes 
in kind. His gardens were hoed, and his houses built, 
by the people. If an elephant was killed its tusks, and 
part of the flesh, were brought to him. Buffalo was 
royal game, and the whole carcase was his; his, too, 
were skins and tails of lion, leopard, and zebra ; tusks 
of hippopotamus, horns of rhinoceros. Once in two 
years each chief brought him a young cow; and a 
portion of all spoils of war in prisoners, cattle, and 
other things, was his due. 

Out of his abundance Chungu gave gifts to 
favourites or valued servants. He received and 
entertained distinguished visitors, though not all 
were admitted to his presence. ‘They arrived with 
horns blowing and drums beating, the leader shouting, 


74. The Chief & his Counsellors 


“Ho, ho, ho, we go to him who kills and saves alive.” 
On arrival, such as had the honour of a personal 
interview, received his blessing, ‘‘ May God be 
gracious to you”; the visitor lying on his back and 
clapping hands. At parting, perhaps a month later, 
he was pressed to stay, but the parting benediction 
was given: ‘“‘God be with you. May lion and 
leopard and hyena, snake and tree and personal 
enemy, be still before you. May you find your 
family in health.” ‘Then taking water, and squirting 
it from his mouth, he prayed the spirits to care for 
the departing guest. 

The duties and powers of Chungu, as they were in 
the past, and, in diminished glory and extent, still 
are, may be briefly stated. 

1. First and foremost, Chungu is the man who 
speaks with God, and offers up the prayers of the 
community in time of war, pestilence, drought, or 
famine. 

2. Dreams by the official dreamers were brought 
to him by the councillors, and measures taken to 
meet the approaching evil by offerings at the graves 
of his ancestors, and by personal intercession. 

3. After consulting his ancestors, he decided ques- 
tions of peace or war. 

4. Along with his councillors he heard important 
lawsuits, and appeals against the decisions of other 
chiefs. 

5. He confirmed in their position subordinate 
chiefs when recommended by his council to do so. 

6. The whole land being his, he gave possessions to 


The Chief & his Counsellors 75 


new-comers, and drove out undesirables ; but always 
with the concurrence of the council. 

7. He gave periodical feasts to all chiefs and their 
followers. 

8. In general, it was the duty of Chungu to keep 
the land in peace ; but no decision of his was valid 
without the approval of his council. 

In the north, across the Songwe, the failure to 
attain unity of control had as its natural consequence 
the failure to attain the same imposing ceremonial 
as at Karonga. ‘The chiefs each retained his inde- 
pendence, and what has now to be said applies equally 
to the independent chiefs of the north, and to those 
of the south who were at one time under the dominion 
of Chungu. 

A convenient starting-point is the installation of 
the heir and successor of a chief. ‘The installation of 
Reuben, which began on 18th September, and ended 
on 19th November, 1921, is typical of all, and the 
description which follows was given to me by himself. 

On the appointed day he left his home, and accom- 
panied by eight young men who were to be his 
subordinate chiefs, and official dreamers, and all the 
young men of his father’s principal village, he went 
to the place which was to be the site of his own 
village. There good huts were built for him and the 
eight young chiefs, and mere shelters for the others. 
The first item in a long ceremonial was the tree- 
planting. The medicine man took two pots into which 
he put two imbigita (lion-making medicines), and 
having filled the pots with earth, he planted a young 


76 The Chief & his Counsellors 


seedling in each, indola in one, and imbandapanda in 
the other. Pits to receive the pots were digged by 
the doctor, and held in position by the two most 
important of the subordinate chiefs, who, with closed 
eyes, filled in the soil all around. ‘The two imbigita 
become later the two lions of the young chief. Every 
chief has these mysterious lions, which are quite 
harmless except to evil-doers ; if any common person 
creates or controls a lion, it is the duty of these two 
to slay it. No one may eat food at harvest time until 
a portion has been set aside for these lions. ‘The two 
trees in time provide the shade under which the 
chief’s court will sit, and as long as they stand his 
residence must not be removed from their neigh- 
bourhood. 

The doctor now took a broom, and swept the dust 
into the faces of Reuben and his subordinates, praying 
that the men under them would be in number as the 
dust of the earth. All the old fires were extinguished, 
and new fire was made by the young chief and his 
fellows ; at present from two pieces of wood rubbed 
together, but in the past, the lower was the bone of a 
leopard or lion specially dried for the purpose. In 
the old warlike days this fire kindled the courage of 
the chiefs, but with the peace that has been brought 
in by the white men such courage is not called for. 
From the fire thus made, brands were given out to 
all householders in the district, and no ashes from old 
fires were allowed to remain in any house. 

Next came the great medicine drinking, which was 
to give authority to the new chiefs. It is indeed a 


The Chief & his Counsellors 77 


fearsome mixture: ground flesh of inmyifwira (the 
flying serpent); heart and nose of hyena, which 
enables one to see danger ahead; heart of hawk, 
giving power to see danger from behind; and heart 
of the fish-eagle, which swoops down upon its prey. 
Thus furnished the young rulers can foresee the 
future, deal with the present, and be a terror to all 
evil-doers. [This powerful medicine is drunk by all 
chiefs at their installation, and spread under the beds 
to make them see in dreams what is coming in the 
future. But never may the chief eat food that is not 
freshly cooked, for that would take away all virtue 
even from these potent drugs. 

From that time until the 19th November, the 
young men led a happy, care-free life. ‘Their food 
was daily provided ; cattle were set apart for them ; 
they did not shave all that time, and no girls were 
allowed to go near them. On the closing day of the 
ceremonial, the fathers of all the young rulers came 
and stood at a distance, and the younger brother of 
Reuben was given a spear with which he knocked on 
the closed door of the hut in which Reuben and his 
companions were waiting, and called out, “ ‘There is 
war outside ; come out.” Immediately all rushed to 
where the elders were standing, and after greetings, 
the company formed itself into a boundary com- 
mission, to fix the limits of Reuben’s authority. 
Finally, the same day, the new chief was married to 
the two girls whose offspring will be his successors. 
They must be daughters of men of note, not cowards 
in battle, of no reproach in the tribe; and the girls 


‘\ 


78 The Chief & his Counsellors 


themselves must be free from any kind of blemish. 
They drink a medicine weaker than that taken by 
their husband, but sufficiently potent to make them 
respected by all the other women of the district. 

The death of a chief, like that of Chungu, is a 
great event. An immense crowd of men and women 
gather on these occasions. At the death of Mwatongo, 
near Karonga, in 1913, fifty head of cattle were killed 
for the feast. Of these perhaps thirty were the 
property of the dead chief ; the rest were brought by 
the mourners as a token of respect for the dead man ; 
but for each animal so killed, an equivalent, an ox 
for an ox, a cow for a cow, was given to the donor 
from the dead man’s herd, so that the herd left by 
Mwafongo was reduced by fifty at his death. Intense 
emotion is generated at these gatherings, frequently 
leading to death. And in the past it was the rule 
that a chief should not go to his fathers alone. If 
therefore fighting broke out, and men were killed, it 
was only right and fitting that this should be so. In 
1897 there was a small rising against the Germans, in 
which the chief Mwakalinga and many of his people 
were killed. ‘The chief having been killed, it was not 
surprising that there should be a heavy death-roll 
among his men. ‘The death of Mwasulama in 1918 
was followed, quite naturally, by the influenza which 
carried off so many of his people. 

About a month after the death of the chief, the 
feasting is resumed, this time with immense quantities 
of beer which has been prepared in the interval. 
The new chief is now anointed with oil, and the 


The Chief & his Counsellors 79 


shout is raised, ‘‘He is our food and our shield.” 
The successor may refuse to act as chief, in which 
case another is chosen by the amafumu (subordinate 
chiefs). 

The duties and privileges of chiefs are similar to 
those of Chungu. They cannot be deprived of their 
position, but if a chief proves himself thoroughly 
unsatisfactory, his people may leave him, and come 
under another, who will willingly receive them. ‘The 
position is not always an enviable one. A chief whose 
people leave him loses position among his fellow- 
chiefs. And he is not always sure of the respect of 
his people. In 1923 a decision given by a lake-shore 
chief so roused the wrath of some of his people that 
they cut down his bananas, a deadly form of insult, 
which in this case has not yet been avenged, because 
the actual perpetrators, though known to many, 
have not been disclosed. Under the British Govern- 
ment, the chief is responsible for the payment of the 
taxes by his people; he must see to the upkeep of 
the roads in his district, to the supply of carriers for 
the Government when asked to do so; and to the 
general good behaviour of his people. He gets three 
to four per cent of the taxes paid in his district. 


CHAPTER VI 
Law & Crime 


AW, morals, and religion are inseparably bound 
up together.» The old idea, still hard to kill, 
that in the native mind morals and religion 
have no connection with each other, is the 

reverse of the truth; but African ideas of morality. 
do not always coincide with European, and to this 
disparity may be traced the belief that there is no 
morality in African religion. ‘The sinless man is the 
man who has broken no law. He is said to be mweru, 
without offence. Now as law and custom are one, and 
as the spirits are jealous for the retention of all 
customs that were in force while they were on earth, 
the man who is assured of a good reception in the 
underworld is he who has either broken no law of 
custom, or, having broken the law, has made the 
required atonement to the injured person. 
Everything was settled in the long distant past by 
the fathers, and all one has to do is to conform. For 
the long domination of ancient custom in law, morals, 
and religion, meant that life had attained to a con- 
dition of stable equilibrium, before the coming of the 
white man set all in confusion again for many of the 


people. ‘The ancient equilibrium was disturbed by 
80 





A PROFESSIONAL DANCER. 


Note the wristlets and anklets, which make a jingling noise as he leaps about. He is stripped 
to the waist. His audience is in front of him. He has thrown his cow-hide shield into the air 
and will catch it as it falls. 


SALT FACTORY AT LAKE RUKWA. 


Large quantities of salt are manufactured every year under Government supervision. The 
heavily impregnated water is evaporated, and the remaining deposit purified, and separated into 
t=) Pp , 
grades, before being offered for sale. 





Law & Crime 81 


law-breaking, and the balance was restored when the 
law was vindicated. ‘The idea that stable equilibrium 
means stagnation is alien to the Konde mind. ‘l’o 
disturb the balance in order to advance to new 
conditions is a European, not a Bantu idea, and 
wherever the European stimulus has been removed, 
the wheels of custom drag heavily again. 

A native court is not, to a white man, an imposing 
spectacle ; though no doubt it is fearsome enough to 
some trembling rascal, who has little reason to hope 
that his misdeeds will escape their due reward. ‘The 
court meets under the village tree, or, if the weather 
is bad, on the verandah of the chief or judge. ‘here 
the chief sits with his headmen if the case is an 
important one, and there are usually a few old men 
present also, in whose memories are stored up records 
of previous cases which may have some bearing on 
the one in hand. ‘The persons concerned are among 
the audience, which sits facing the court ; and when 
called upon, they rise in turn, and conduct the case 
from where they stand. ‘The native is a keen dis- 
puter. I have known a clever man fight his case with 
amazing skill and perseverance; even after it was 
clear that the evidence against him was complete, he 
would go on adducing fact after fact with a dialectical 
skill that would not disgrace a European lawyer at 
cross-examination, If the judge is a man with a 
sense of humour, he often announces his decision by 
relating some well-known story, the point of which 
is taken by all, as, with expressions of approval or 


otherwise, they rise and go. Execution of sentence 
F 


8 2 Law & Crime 


does not delay, but is carried out immediately. The 
loser may, however, appeal to another judge for a re- 
hearing of the case. Compensation in some form, 
usually cattle, or hoes, or, in a few cases, a daughter, 
is the sentence. 

Theft-——The extraordinary boldness and skill of 
the Nyakyusa thieves are widely known. Outside their 
own country their reputation is perhaps greater than 
they deserve, great though that is. At one place 
guards are doubled when it is known that Nyakyusa 
carriers have arrived. No European house has 
escaped their attentions, to the greater or smaller loss 
of the owner. They break through brick walls, enter 
by door or window, conduct their operations by day 
or night, with equal indifference and success ; and the 
speed with which recognizable goods are disposed of, 
adds to the mystery of their methods. 

A white man was recently robbed while reading in 
bed with dogs beside him, the thieves quietly lifting 
and carrying off a heavy trunk, which they believed 
to contain a large amount of cash, before the owner 
knew that they were in the room. Another had the 
whole of his kit taken while he himself was in the next 
room; a medical man had his hand-bag taken from 
his bedroom at about five in the afternoon; in yet 
another case the sum of two hundred shillings was 
quietly carried off from a table while three Europeans 
were sitting in the next room at breakfast. Sheets 
have been taken off beds, and the owners knew 
nothing of their loss until bed-time revealed the fact. 
Rifles and accoutrements have been removed from 


Law & Crime 83 


beside sleeping native soldiers, and blankets taken 
from under sleeping men. A few months ago all the 
contents of a native house were taken off at midday ; 
and a workman of mine, returning to his home at five 
in the evening, found that everything had been taken 
in his absence, though his house is in a village of 
considerable size. Considerations of meanness never 
hinder a thief when an opportunity presents itself. 
One Saturday, some time ago, an old widow, in 
preparation for the Sunday service in the Mission 
Church, washed her one garment, and spread it out 
on a bush to dry. Having nothing else to wear, she 
lay down behind another bush ; and presently along 
came a man who snatched off the garment and ran, 
pursued by the shrill objurgations of the disconsolate 
widow, the only punishment he ever received. 

The thieving community forms a kind of federa- 
tion, and gangs are made up from many different 
districts. There is a family some distance from here 
which boasts that they were thieves before the white 
man came and taught them! ‘The thieves are known 
in the villages to which they belong, but they are 
never betrayed, either because of the fear which they 
undoubtedly inspire; or, in some cases, because the 
chiefs get a share of the proceeds of the industry. 
The number of thieves, and the amount of thieving, 
has greatly increased since the British occupation of 
‘Tanganyika ‘Territory, to the disgust of honest men, 
who openly express their admiration for other aspects 
of British rule, but are very frank in their criticism of 
what they call our softness in dealing with evil-doers. 


8 4. Law & Crime 


The complaint is not seldom made that in this respect 
they were better off under the Germans, for the 
Germans had a vigorous way with rascals, while now 
criminals are cared for in comfortable prisons, while 
honest men suffer loss for which they get no com- 
pensation. Professional thieves openly jeer at the 
sentences imposed: good feeding, houses, fires, 
blankets, and back to your “‘ work ”’ in fatter and fitter 
condition than when you left it! 

So openly, so far as their own immediate neigh- 
bourhoods are concerned, are thieving operations 
carried on, that both the doctor and the diviner (the 
two ofhces are often combined in one person) are 
consulted; the former to find out whether the 
proposed plans will be successful, the latter to supply 
the necessary medicines. Watchers being stationed 
to give the alarm, medicine is thrown on the roof of 
the house to be robbed, to make sure that the inmates 
shall sleep soundly; and on the door, to make it 
open of itself, as many seriously believe. On enter- 
ing, the first man in begins by handing out all weapons, 
so rendering the owner defenceless should he awaken ; 
then a brand from the fire, which is always burning in 
every house, is waved about to fill the place with 
smoke ; and a third medicine is placed under the 
heads of the sleeping people of the house. If the 
thieves dig in, as they often do, the work is performed 
with remarkable silence. When the hole is big enough, 
a large banana leaf is thrust in and moved about, to 
test if the inmates are really sleeping. Then one man 
goes in feet first, for a spear-wound in the foot from a 


Law & Crime 8 5 


watchful householder is less serious than the thrust 
through the chest which ended the life of an in- 
cautious robber a year ago. 

When everything has been handed out to con- 
federates, the doors are opened, and the cattle taken 
out; for the latter sleep in the same house as their 
owners; a custom which is attributed to the con- 
viction that in no other way is there any chance at all 
of defending their property. If the owner has been 
killed in the house, the cattle, I am assured, will 
refuse to move; but they will pass over the dead 
body if placed in the doorway, and give no further 
trouble. Murder is a not infrequent accompaniment 
of cattle stealing. A woman was killed with a blow of 
an axe, not five miles from my house, because she 
awoke and cried out when thieves were making off 
with their booty. There is a story, which has been 
only partially confirmed by the police, that in 1923 
six persons were killed by the owners of cattle with 
which they were making off. The cattle lowed while 
being removed, the owners were roused, and over- 
took the thieves, who were killed in the fight which 
ensued. 

Old stories say that thieves possess medicine which 
make it impossible for them to be recognized should 
the victim waken up while they are still in the house. 
They ask him if he knows who they are ; and as death 
may be the penalty of an afhirmative answer, it is 
easy to believe that it is rarely given. So confident 
are the thieves of the power of the drug, that they 
sometimes coolly arouse their victims, and compel 


86 Law & Crime 


them to cook for them. One brave man, thus occu- 
pied, suddenly thrust a blazing brand into the face of 
one of his spoilers, whereupon he and his confederates 
bolted. 

The native law of reprisal is the same as the old 
American law of horse stealing—death on the spot if 
caught. ‘The chief did not interfere in such cases. On 
the contrary, he was indignant if criminals of this kind 
were brought to him. He refused to look at them, 
and reminded the captors that it was their duty to 
kill them where they were caught: let them be taken 
off and dealt with according to the law without further 
parley. Hanging on a tree was the commonest mode 
of disposing of captured thieves. 

But the Konde loves his cattle, and not all the fear 
of the thieves and their medicines will hinder some 
individuals from doing all in their power to recover 
their property. An old man came some time ago to 
ask the loan of forty shillings. He explained that he 
had been robbed, and that his plan was to go through 
the country offering to buy a cow, in the hope that 
the thieves, not recognizing him, would offer him his 
own animal. It is pleasing to relate that the old man’s 
plan was completely successful. Per contra, thieves 
sometimes bring intelligence, of a kind, to bear upon 
their profession, and cases are known where they have 
actually charged the real owner with having stolen 
their cattle, and had them awarded to them. 

In strong contrast to the Nyakyusa of the north, 
the people of Karonga, though they steal from each 
other, do not steal from Europeans. During five years 


Law & Crime 87 


residence there, I never locked my doors, and the only 
theft of which I had to complain was the pendulum 
of a clock taken from an open building ! 

Murder.—Murder is, from the native point of view, 
a much less serious crime than cattle stealing. But it 
should be remembered that British law calls crimes 
murder which are not so called by the Konde. A man 
who kills his wife’s paramour has not committed mur- 
der: he has exacted a just revenge, and no more. In 
a case of real murder, the murderer or his friends 
usually pay a fine, or rather a compensation, of up to 
ten head of cattle ; and the loss to the family of the 
murdered man is further made good by the other 
family handing over a daughter. This girl must never 
be spoken of as a substitute, for that would cause her 
children, when she has them, to die. It is needless to 
add that under British law compensation of any kind 
to the family of the murdered person does not acquit 
the murderer. What follows, therefore, is purely 
native law, which, if administered at all, is adminis- 
tered only when there is reason to believe that the 
police will never come to hear of it. 

When a murder was committed, the chief directed 
the friends of the murderer to bring him for trial, but 
if they chose to put him to death themselves, the case 
was ended. Should it be impossible to discover the 
murderer, a friend of his, it hardly mattered who, was 
put to death, and a wide-extending vendetta might 
be the result. When the law is satisfied, a formal 
reconciliation between the two families takes place. 
Under the guidance of the medicine man, who is 


88 Law & Crime 


master of ceremonies on all such occasions, a sheep, 
provided by the family of the murderer, is killed, and 
taken hold of by the parties, while the doctor divides 
the carcase into two parts, each side taking its share. 
Medicine is poured into a pot, and a red-hot spear is 
plunged into it. The carcase of the sheep, cooked with 
this medicine, is placed upon banana leaves, and the 
feast of reconciliation is partaken of, along with beer 
which also has been doctored. ‘The reconciliation, 
however, is not complete until the girl has been 
handed over: until that is done, the feast has only 
stayed action on the part of the murdered man’s 
relatives. If the murderer is not known, the relatives 
of the victim drink a medicine, without which, if they 
happened unwittingly to drink water in the culprit’s 
house, they would themselves also die. 

The murder of a pregnant woman is a very serious 
matter, for it is really a double murder, and the chief 
has to be compensated for the loss of dependents. It 
is more heinous to murder a woman than a man, for 
the woman, being dead, bears no more children, and 
loss to the community results. 

For accidental death there are numerous regulations. 
If a man dies, or is killed, while in the employment of 
another, or on a journey with him, compensation must 
be paid to the relatives. There is no feast of recon- 
ciliation, for the thing was not done in malice. When 
a person is killed by an ox or a cow, the owner pays a 
cow, and kills the offending animal, lest it lead him 
into further trouble and expense of the same kind, 
If one is cutting down a tree, and some one is killed by 


Law & Crime 89 


its fall; or if one sends another up a tree to get fruit, 
or for any other purpose, and the person falls down 
and is killed, a cow must be paid in compensation ; if 
he is only injured, some smaller payment is made. 
If I permit a suicide to take place in my house, I must 
pay a cow, for I ought to have taken better care of 
my house. If a man kills himself with my spear I 
come under a similar penalty, and for the same reason. 
If a woman suckles another woman’s child and it dies, 
the law of compensation holds good, and a cow must 
be paid. Very many regulations of this kind, which 
it would be a weariness to repeat, exist among the 
Konde people. 

The spear with which a murder has been committed 
is cut off short at the haft, and the blade bent over 
with a stone, and it is then hung up in the roof of the 
house of a relative of the murderer. 

Murder is frequently committed by means of 
poison and by witchcraft; and in either case it is 
difficult to trace the criminal. As an instance: a man 
is very quarrelsome in his village, an intolerable 
nuisance in fact. After a while he goes off to work 
somewhere, and now is the opportunity to get rid of 
him. In a few months news comes that he has been 
killed in a quarrel ; but the quarrel was brought on by 
witchcraft. His fellow-villagers went to a sorcerer, 
and persuaded him to stir up the quarrelsome one to 
some disagreement in his new home, which would be 
sure to end in his death. No British magistrate would 
consider a charge of murder in such a case, except 
against the actual murderers, but the Konde will not 


go Law & Crime 


be convinced that the real facts are otherwise than 
as I have stated. The clumsy methods of murder 
favoured by the cleverest of European criminals take 
an inferior place before the successful malignity of 
this kind of thing. 

Witchcraft-—No crime is regarded with so much 
abhorrence among Bantu peoples as the crime of 
witchcraft. It isa crime against the whole community, 
anti-social, destructive ; and the punishment, in many 
cases, was death. ‘That punishment cannot now be 
inflicted, but a recent Ordinance against pretended 
witchcraft has given much satisfaction to the people, 
even although the punishment is less than they think 
the crime demands. ‘To them there is no pretence 
about it ; itisa grave reality. Ifthe poison cup proved 
a person guilty, he was immediately attacked with any 
weapon that came handy, and as a rule he was dead 
before he reached the end of the gauntlet ; but if, as 
now and again happened, he got off alive, he lost no 
time in getting away to another district. In the not 
so very remote past, the guilty person was burned to 
death in his own house, and not always did his family 
escape a like fate. A special punishment was reserved 
for witchcraft by crocodile. ‘This particular crime 
consists in bewitching a crocodile to kill an enemy. 
The criminal, when discovered, was put into the water 
in a large fish-trap, and left there until a crocodile 
came and made an end. 

Adultery.—TVhis offence is said to have increased 
greatly since the coming of the white man, who will 
not permit the death penalty to be inflicted. But the 


Law & Crime gt 


Konde does not resign what he considers his’ natural 
right on that account, and will take his chance of the 
white man’s justice, if he can first get in with his own. 
Dramatically enough, a case occurred while I was 
working at the first draft of this chapter. A man came 
into my office, sweating at every pore, excitement in 
his eyes, and his whole bearing indicating something 
very unusual. 

“ Well,” I said, “who are you? What is your 
name? ” 

‘“‘T am Mwandobero of Mwakete,” he said. “I 
have killed a man.” 

“So! And what do you expect me to do about 
He th? 

“Tie me up, and send me to the police.” 

“It’s not my business,” I said, “ to tie men up. 
Go to the police yourself.” 

‘Can a man go to the police himself with a story 
like that? ” 

“ Well,” I said, “ 1 will give you a letter, which you 
can take to the superintendent.” 

“Thank you, Bwana.” 

A few questions brought out the facts, which were 
what I expected them to be. His wife had that morn- 
ing gone off with another man. The husband pursued 
the runaway couple, overtook them somewhere in the 
bush, made a fierce pass at the man with his spear, 
and then ran the five miles between the scene of the 
crime and my house. A few hours later | met him, 
in charge of an armed policeman, going to discover 
what had actually taken place. He grinned a friendly 


92 Law &° Crime 


greeting, and passed on, without constraint of any kind. 
It turned out that the man was only slightly wounded ; 
but most husbands in such circumstances ‘‘ mak’ siccar.”’ 

If the guilty paramour escapes, he goes to another 
chief, who receives and protects him, unless his co- 
sinner is the wife of a chief, in which case the man is 
sent back to meet whatever punishment awaits him. 
The woman, as I have already said, is liable to the 
extreme penalty also, but I know of no case in which 
it has been inflicted, and I think it is of very rare 
occurrence. An alternative punishment was to have 
her ears cut off. ‘There is a woman living in the neigh- 
bourhood who, along with her paramour, suffered 
this penalty lately, but the chief by whose orders it 
was done was heavily fined by the administrative officer. 
Other punishments are still in use, which will not bear 
the light of print. A wife found guilty is divorced 
without further question, and the cattle returned to 
the husband. Divorce is often sought for very trivial 
reasons, but native courts will not seriously consider 
ill-supported claims. 

Arson.—Vhere is a general rule that accidental 
burning of another man’s goods must be compensated 
for, by replacing all that is lost, whether that be a 
mere shilling’s worth, or a house and all its contents. 
Arson proper, however, is a much more serious crime, 
and in the past involved the enslavement of the 
criminal and all his family. Not a few cases of arson 
are among the crimes that are common to-day. The 
church at Karonga was burned down in 1921, probably 
as an act of revenge against a Christian ; but a common 


Law & Crime 93 


explanation among the heathen is that it was the work 
of an ex-Christian who had died the previous day, and 
took the earliest opportunity, in his new state, of being 
revenged on those who had expelled him from the 
Church. In any case the act cost the Christian com- 
munity at Karonga a large sum of money. Burning a 
house is a method frequently resorted to of “‘ getting 
one’s own back” from one’s enemy, and detection is 
extremely difficult. 

The Land Laws.—All the land belongs to the chief, 
who divides it among his various headmen, and they 
in turn give it out to their immediate followers. New- 
comers are admitted and given lands by the headmen, 
but the grant must be confirmed by the chief, without 
whose consent no arrangement is final. ‘This owner- 
ship by the chief is not mere theory, but, on the other 
hand, the individual has practically permanent rights 
in his property. He cannot be turned out at the mere 
caprice of anyone, and he hands on his lands to his 
heirs. Absence, even for many years, does not affect 
ownership, provided that wife or friends cultivate the 
land in the meantime. 

The law of trespass was very severe in the past, and 
would remain so if the natives had their way. ‘Tres- 
pass, however, does not mean merely walking over 
another man’s ground; in that sense there is no 
trespass. It means annexation with the hoe; and if, 
in the fight which followed discovery, the trespasser 
was killed, a charge of murder did not lie against the 
owner ; but if the owner was killed, the trespasser was 
indicted for murder. If the case was remitted to the 


94 Law & Crime 


chief, a cow was paid in compensation, for the man 
could not be put to death in cold blood. 

A thief caught in a garden stealing growing crops 
is stripped of his manyeta (body rings) if he has them: 
otherwise whatever he has is taken. ‘This law is still 
nominally in force, but the culprit often prefers to 
take his trial at the hands of the administrative officer. 
And the owner has no choice, for if he takes possession 
by force of what native law considers his rights, he is 
likely to find himself accused of an illegal act. 


CHAPTER VII 
Things Forbidden 


HEN the Konde wish to say that a certain 

thing is prohibited, they call it mwzko, a 

word which includes all that is more 

popularly known as tabu, prohibitions con- 
nected with religion, good manners, medicines; in 
short there is a code of regulations which might well 
be called the laws of life, were it not that they are in 
all cases prohibitions, and never injunctions directing 
one what to do. What is mwiko is what is forbidden, 
and it is forbidden because it is disgraceful, wicked, 
improper, inconvenient. No decent person ever 
breaks these laws intentionally, but the punishment 
for unwitting breach is the same as for the most 
wicked intention ; it is in most cases automatic, falling 
indifferently upon the well- and the ill-intentioned. 
But whiie this is so, the punishment is by no means 
inevitable ; medicines, ceremonies, payments, can 
avert most of them, leaving little except the curse of 
a father, and one or two other things, against which 
there is no protection. 

The native has no explanation of these prohibitions, 
except that they were handed down from the fathers. 
They are all the more valid for that ; buried deep in 
the past, and coming upon each individual with all 

95 


96 Things Forbidden 


the authority and mystery of the ages, he accepts 
them unquestioningly ; nor would his faith be at all 
weakened if he knew that in some cases punishment 
had failed to follow transgression. He would conclude 
that protection had in some acknowledged way been 
found, but he had not happened to hear of it. To 
break a tabu in order to see what would happen is an 
act of folly so extreme that only a few men can afford 
to risk it. 

Anything like a complete account of the endless 
prohibitions which hedge the life of the Konde is not 
attempted here. He meets them when he first opens 
his eyes upon the world, and parts from them only 
when he goes to the land of spirits, where, no doubt, 
another set of laws awaits him. While he lives he has 
to be on the watch for prohibitions referring to God 
and the spirits ; to persons, acts, words, places, animals, 
and in some degree to time itself. 

Thus it is mwiko to use the name of God unneces- 
sarily in taking an oath; nor may the name of the 
chief be used with too much freedom, tata, father, 
being his more common appellation. A wife may 
never speak of her father-in-law by name, nor a hus- 
band of his mother-in-law. Some parts of the body 
are mwiko, and are not named. Animals, again, especi- 
ally dangerous animals, are more dangerous if their 
names are used, for the name calls the owner to the 
place where it is heard. A lion or leopard known to 
be prowling about at night is referred to as tata, 
father ; and if the animal is being hunted, one coming 
in later to join in the hunt must not ask, “‘ Where is 


‘suiddejo puey pure sursuts ‘stanap jo }USTMIUvd MOON’ UL 0} SOTHT? & 7e OXY IO 
Apv s1o0Uvp YOIYM OFU! PoWIO}J st a[O1l9 B ATUOWIUIOD ynq ‘aouKp CTOs Jo pury & st UMOYS st Jey AA 
MOI} olf A[[eENSN st puv ‘UOTUMIOIUN jou sI SulOURp yYysiAep qnq ‘ 


‘ 


9U0 “ADI 





‘syuouruedutooov ofqeuonoel[qo 






Ao AT[VIOW oie Way. yo Auew pur “yystu ye vovfd aye} soouvp AyTensgq 


PONV Olisng yi 








Things Forbidden Q7 


it? ” even although he avoids the name. If a woman 
about to go for water or firewood hears anyone use 
the word for lion, she will not go. An elephant in the 
garden is referred to, very strangely, as ikisu, the 
world; a crocodile is ikya mmisi, the thing in the 
water ; and a snake is referred to as ‘‘ the thing from 
the grass.”” ‘The name of a dead person is not used by 
relatives. 

Again, it is mwiko to see certain persons. Chungu, 
in the past, must not be seen by young people, though 
I have been unable to learn that anything very dreadful 
happened to them if they did. On the other hand, 
children are still kept away from great doctors, whose 
glance has power to kill them ; nor may anyone watch 
a doctor making up his medicines. 

Growing crops and food being cooked must not be 
approached by unclean persons, for the uncleanness 
would pass over and affect the food or the crops; as 
it would affect other persons if they came near the 
unclean. Uncleanness is transmissible, and the full 
ceremonial of the original uncleanness must be gone 
through by the one to whom it has been transmitted, 
lest it should desecrate the whole community with 
its living tabu. 

Prohibited places are numerous, chief among them 
being graves, which are mwiko to all except the 
families to which they belong. It is forbidden to 
work when a dead person is being mourned for, but I 
cannot learn that a breach of this rule would imply 
anything except disrespect to the dead. 


If we try to classify the prohibitions we shall find 
G 


98 Things Forbidden 


that the classes tend to shade into each other, leaving 
no clear line of demarcation between one class and 
another; but there are some that are quite definitely 
religious, and with these we may begin. 

It is forbidden to mock at the lame, the deaf, the 
blind, the dumb, or persons otherwise unfortunate. 
The wrath of God is aroused, and the offender will 
suffer the disability he laughs at in others. ‘‘ Who 


mocks an orphan,” 


says an old proverb; “let him 
beware; God is watching him.” ‘To insult one’s 
father is a crime so great that nothing can avert the 
curse which follows, and follows automatically. The 
prohibition against the use of names, too, has in 
some cases certainly, in others probably, a religious 
sanction. It is mwiko for anyone but the family 
representative to pray to the spirits; though, in a 
case known to me, where a Christian prayed in an 
assembly of chiefs and others gathered for the purpose, 
and the rain asked for duly came, the older people 
acknowledged that the event justified the breach of 
custom. 

Omission of the customary funeral rites is disgrace- 
ful, and the dead man will not fail to avenge himself 
upon the offender. A case came to my knowledge 
quite recently where a son refused to perform the 
usual ceremonies for his just-departed father, and the 
life of his own son was barely saved, so every one 
believed, by a timely surrender. It is an interesting 
fact that no opprobrium attaches to a Christian who 
omits these rites, nor does any visitation follow from 
the spirit land, while upon a heathen the punishment 


Things Forbidden 99 


falls automatically. If the family “‘ priest”? becomes 
a Christian, and therefore ceases to pray to the 
spirits, no one will take up his religious duties until 
he has been publicly appointed by the family to do so. 

To offer a blemished animal in sacrifice, to eat the 
blood of a sacrificed animal, to eat animals that do not 
divide the hoof, are all forbidden ; though the double 
qualification, to divide the hoof and chew the cud, is 
not insisted upon. ‘This has direct religious sanction, 
but whether the prohibition against eating beasts of 
prey is so founded, I do not know. ‘The Bandali 
even now will eat lion’s flesh, and at Karonga long 
aco, though not now, the crocodile was eaten. 

Night belongs to the spirits, and certain things 
must not be done then. If a woman sweeps out the 
house at night, her husband will indignantly ask her 
why she is driving off his ancestors! ‘The spirits cut 
their hair at night, therefore living men must not. 
If bark-cloth is beaten out at night, the cattle will 
die; and if food is pounded or firewood cut up, 
leopards will come, and kill cattle, and perhaps 
people. It is mwiko to clap the hands at night (except 
openly in the dance), for the spirits do so, and imita- 
tion might be regarded by them as mockery, not 
flattery. A fire should not be kindled at night, nor 
should one lie on his back if lightning is playing 
around, for the lightning gets at one more easily in 
that position. ‘To sit in the doorway at night is to 
usurp the place of the spirits when ceremonies are 
being performed. 

Animals in which the spirits dwell, frogs, lizards, 


100 Things Forbidden 


snakes, lions, crocodiles, must not be carelessly killed. 
Kall a frog, and you will become a leper; the spirit 
that lived in the frog will see to that. Not that a 
spirit dwells in every frog ; but why take unnecessary 
risks! As for the lizard, what harm has it ever done 
to anyone? ‘The stronger and more dangerous 
animals can take care of themselves; but again, not 
every one of these is inhabited by a spirit; one that 
kills people may be safely killed. The two-headed 
snake, Ndumirakosa, may be the temporary dwelling 
of God Himself, and must not be killed. ‘The owl is 
perhaps in a different category: it is a favourite 
dwelling of sorcerers; and some insist on killing it 
for that very reason, while others say that to kill it is 
mMw1RO0. 

Hair must not be swept up, but picked up, and all 
foreign matter separated; else death may follow, 
either by witchcraft, or by the action of the spirits. 
It must not be left lying about, lest goats should eat 
it; in which case the late owner will assuredly 
become bald! ‘The hair on the chest again, must not 
be cut, for one’s children will die. All this no doubt 
had a religious sanction in the past; but no Konde 
will admit that it is any more than a custom handed 
down, and for that reason to be carefully observed. 

The jealousy of the spirits demands that a child 
dying during the life of its paternal grandfather, be 
buried at the house of the latter, not at its own 
father’s ; that the child of a second wife be buried 
at the house of the principal wife ; and that a man 
who would die well, should die at the house of his 


Things Forbidden Io1l 


first wife, for it is there only that the spirits meet 
him; and if he becomes ill anywhere else, he has 
himself removed as soon as possible to the place 
where it is proper for him to die, if die he must. 

A man who has been falsely reported dead in a far 
land, must not, on his return home, enter the village 
without ceremony. Letters sent on ahead to assure 
his relatives that he is alive, are not enough; his 
father comes out to meet him; but he takes care not 
to see his son until assurance has been given that he 
is a true man, not a spirit; whereupon the father 
throws some food over his son’s head, and both enter 
the village in peace. 

It is mwiko to kill a python unless one is sure that 
it is dangerous. If it is found in the feeding ground, 
and the cows that day give a specially good milking, 
then it has been herding the cattle, and is not to be 
sought for afterwards with hostile intent. But the 
boys who saw it must go to the doctor to get medicine. 
Further, God Himself may be in it, or the spirit of a 
dead chief, and therefore it must be watched for 
assurance of its friendliness. If it enters a house a 
fowl is thrown to it, with which, if it makes off, all is 
well. 

Very interesting are some of the prohibitions con- 
nected with the white man; and it is obvious that 
these are of recent growth, so that we actually see 
tabus in the making. It is mwiko to go into a white 
man’s house, for the pictures on his walls are the 
spirits of his ancestors, who are specially dangerous 
at night, when they may launch an unseen spear at 


102 Things Forbidden 


the unlucky wight who has had the temerity to enter 
so dangerous a place. Further, a man dying of that 
invisible spear-wound will almost certainly have his 
portion with the spirits of white men, than which 
there is no more undesirable fate. Did he not have 
enough of the white men here on earth? This fear 
of the white man is passing; but there are still old 
men and women who will not approach him, for they 
insist that he is God, and it is mwiko to see God. An 
old man died recently at Karonga, who had always 
refused to see a white man, lest the sight should 
smite him down. One of the teachers at the Mission 
at Ipyana told me that his own mother will not go 
near him when he has on a white garment, for that, 
she knows, is the sign that he is going to speak to God, 
and even a native is dangerous at such a time, for the 
power of God may break through to destruction. 
There is a curious belief still lingering among old 
people, that Europeans are forbidden to sleep in 
houses, but must come out at night, and sleep in 
pools, their native element being water; for they 
are water spirits in origin, a belief no doubt due to 
the widespread story that we came from the sea itself, 
rather than from some place beyond it. White people 
are supposed to hold it mwiko to weep for the dead ; 
and indeed why should they, seeing their dead arise 
at once and appear on the walls? 

Some great chiefs must not tell if they have been 
wounded in battle. ‘These remarkable men have 
power to remove a wound from a fatal to a non-fatal 
spot, and so recover. When Mwakalinga, in a fight 


Things Forbidden 103 


with the Germans, was struck in the forehead by a 
bullet, he immediately removed the wound to his 
leg, where it was harmless. His amafumu (subordinate 
chiefs), however, sternly ordered him to replace itis 
for he had been toying with Christianity, to the 
disgust of his subordinates, who, seeing a chance to 
get rid of him, eagerly seized it, and Mwakalinga 
passed to his fathers. Mwafongo at Karonga has the 
same power, and there may be others. 

War is attended with so many religious ceremonies 
that the tabus connected with it are best taken under 
this head. Cowardice in battle is mwiko, and the 
coward gets no share of the spoils. There is a beer 
feast as part of the preparation for war ; but drunken- 
ness before a battle is strictly forbidden. At the 
approach of war, husbands and wives must not live 
together, and he who is guilty of illegal intercourse 
will be killed at the first spear throw, before he has 
had time to throw his own spear ; while a chief who 
is given to such acts will be defeated, and his men 
slain. 

Prohibitions due to fear of infection are very 
numerous. One must not pass over the outstretched 
legs of another, for the offender will be “ caught ” 
by any disease from which the offended may be 
suffering ; but a slight nip in the leg of the other by 
the offender wards off evil consequences. It is mwzko 
to throw a spear at a hyena, for the animal may escape 
with a wound, and barrenness will result for the 
offender, unless he goes at once to get counteracting 
medicines. If your father comes to visit you, you 


104 Things Forbidden 


must not give him your own mat to sit on; he sits on 
a leaf, which is thrown away when he leaves you ; 
otherwise your wives will become thin, and will have 
no children. It is miko for an aunt to pat a nephew 
or niece on the buttocks, lest any disease she has may 
pass over to them. A man in an epileptic fit must 
not be roused; he who rouses him will himself 
become epileptic ! 

‘The saliva is sacred, and is often used in religious 
ceremonies ; but to spit upon a man is mwiko, and 
may bring itch and scab if payment is not made. 
The kidneys of an animal may be eaten only if given 
to you by a chief, or handed on the point of a spear ; 
death of your children is the penalty of neglect of this 
precaution. Disease clings to the drug that is used 
to cure it; what is left must be thrown away where 
no one passes, lest a chance passer-by touching it 
with his foot be smitten by the disease. For possibly 
similar reasons, the family of a murdered man must 
not have friendly relations with the family of the 
murderer until the necessary ceremonies have been 
attended to: the spear that killed their friend may 
kill them too; that is to say, they may be smitten 
with a disease which reasonable men will trace to 
their folly in being friendly with hostile persons. 
The leaves upon which a man sat while his case was 
being tried have mysterious powers in them; a 
sorcerer may make deadly medicine out of them: 
therefore it is mwiko not to throw them carefully 
away. 

The blood of a lion killed in the hunt must not be 


Things Forbidden 105 


allowed to escape ; it has ifingira, the most powerful 
of all drugs, and is divided between the chief and the 
great doctors, who alone may cut up a lion’s carcase. 
Another very powerful drug is ilibobwe, which, if 
cast into a doctor’s house, destroys the virtue of all 
his medicines ; and if carried through a garden will 
wither up all crops; it is therefore mwiko to possess 
it unless one is a doctor. 

The code of manners includes prohibitions against 
speaking with the mouth full in the presence of 
elders; the elders will curse the offender with dire 
results ; against spitting, for sorcerers only are great 
enough to dare, and one may be accused of sorcery. 
If a great man is passing, one must sit right down on 
the ground to salute him; to sit on a chair or any 
kind of seat is grossly bad manners, and is mwiko ; it 
is followed by the unspoken but unfailing curse. 
Nakedness, even among the unclothed Konde, is a 
serious offence; at the least a small apron of leaves 
must be worn, for sorcerers go naked at night, and a 
charge may lie against anyone found unclad. If a 
stranger, notwithstanding the prohibition against it, 
asks for food, it must not be refused: how do you 
know that he is not a friend of Kabeta, who will send 
lions to punish you for churlishness! A woman must 
not eat while the males of her family are eating; if 
she does, her husband will talk to her presently. 
When on a journey, the young men must go first to 
face the dangers of the road; it is mwiko for the 
elders or chiefs to be in front. If two companies 
meet, they must not mix; each keeps its own side of 


106 Things Forbidden 


the road, and all spears must be lowered from the 
“ready ” position, as must axes or other weapons. 
It is mwzko to attend to one’s personal comfort in a 
public place. 

The prohibitions connected with women are very 
numerous, and only a selection is given. A pregnant 
woman may not go near food in any condition, 
growing, being threshed, or being cooked ; nor may 
she go near beer that is being prepared. If she goes 
out of the house, she must not turn back in the door- 
way ; the ancestors are there ; she must go right out, 
and if she needs to go in again, she must do it from a 
pace or so from the door. The penalty is the death of 
the child she is carrying. An interesting prohibition 
is that against going behind anyone, and it applies 
specially though not exclusively to women. ‘The 
incised medicine of the person behind whom she 
passes loses its virtue ; but the evil may be averted by 
the person turning round to face her. A woman must 
not sweep rubbish out of the house ; she must lift it 
out; to sweep it out is to scatter her husband’s 
wealth. 

The younger wife must not begin sowing or plant- 
ing until the elder has begun ; she must not sleep at 
night nearer the fire than the elder; she must carry 
loads for the elder wife, and be generally in a sub- 
ordinate position. There is no reluctance on the part 
of the first wife to see her husband taking others ; 
the more he has the greater is her position. A singular 
prohibition is that which forbids a man to take his 
widowed mother home to care for her; he must care 


Things Forbidden 107 


for her where she is, or at any rate at a distance from 
his own house. 

Twins are among the greatest of misfortunes ; and 
along with twins are counted children born feet first. 
This subject is dealt with separately, and it needs 
only to be noted that parents are segregated, must 
not speak even to each other except in whispers, 
must not drink milk, lest the cow should dry up, or 
give only water. ‘The mother must not pass behind 
anyone without asking for permission, which is given 
by clapping hands ; nor may she pass her own father 
without a ceremony in which she throws dust over 
his head. This goes on until another child is born, or 
until about five years have elapsed. 

It is mwiko for a dog to drink the milk of a cow that 
has recently calved ; the cow will dry up. The same 
result will follow if strangers go into the house while 
cows are being milked. It is forbidden to common 
people to eat new season’s food until chiefs and 
village headmen and twins have eaten first ; and even 
they eat only when the first fruits have been mixed 
with medicine by the doctor. The first fish of the 
season must not be taken to the village. It is eaten 
at the river by the boys. It belongs to the spirits. 
To make a sucking noise with the lips is mwzko, being 
a token of impudence ; it may also lead to accusation 
of witchcraft. Never steal from a blacksmith; the 
scraps of iron you steal will produce a noise in your 
throat like the noise of his bellows, and presently you 
will die. 


For a man to see his daughter-in-law, no matter 


108 Things Forbidden 


how unwittingly, is one of the gravest of misfortunes. 
“He will never die,” say some; but this apparently 
startling fate means no more than he will fall into one 
sickness after another, and finally will die in a weak 
and undesirable old age. Others believe in a different 
kind of ill-luck. The man will be accursed, and will 
be unable to stand upright, but will be obliged to 
crawl on his buttocks all his life, scourged by an evil 
spirit which dwells in him. If the daughter-in-law 
sees her husband’s father, she has merely committed 
a breach of good manners, and suffers no evil in 
consequence. 


Criat TER VILLE. 
Domestic Animals : Agriculture 


MONG the Konde the cow is queen. ‘The 
people are reasonably musical, but no sound 
strikes more pleasantly upon their ears than 
the raucous bellowing of cow and calf as 

they return from the pasturelands in the early after- 
noon. No Irishman ever rejoiced in his pigs as the 
Konde do in their cattle. The young men sleep with 
them ; the children play with them. ‘The cow pays 
the tax and finds the wife; she compensates for 
injuries and wipes out insults. Feuds and bonds are 
based on and settled by cattle. They are the cause 
of three-quarters of the crimes, and three-quarters of 
the virtues of the people; they are prolific in law- 
suits before the European magistrate and the native 
chief. Indeed, the song of the cow and the Konde 
might be extended to the dimensions of a small epic. 
The great majority of the men invest all their spare 
cash in cattle, convinced that they get at once greater 
security and higher interest than in any other invest- 
ment open to them. The total number possessed by 
the tribe is not less than one hundred thousand 
head. 


Every animal in a herd answers to its own name, 
109 


110 Domestic Animals : Agriculture 


and will follow the caller wherever he goes. They 
come to be milked morning and evening, and no cow 
moves until her name is called. The greatest insult 
that can be offered to a man is to sprinkle milk on the 
road behind him as he passes, suggesting, “ You are 
too incompetent to provide yourself and your family 
with milk to drink; I can spare some to mock you 
with.” And each man is jealous of the quality of his 
herd. A year or two ago,a wedding party went to 
pay over a cow to the bride’s father. It was not a 
high-class animal: a bystander threw a taunt, and in 
the fight which followed, two men were killed, and a 
number wounded. 

The man is the owner of the cattle as a rule. It is 
rare for the wife to own any ; but sometimes a father 
will make his daughter a present of a cow, which 
becomes hers absolutely, to pass, with its increase, to 
her son at her death or his marriage. The husband 
also may set a cow apart for his wife, but it returns 
to him in case of divorce. 

During the day the cattle are herded by the village 
boys, each family sending one or two in turn to the 
work. ‘They have a thoroughly good time, though 
for the smaller boys it is rather a testing time of 
moral and muscle, for they have a severe apprentice- 
ship to serve. Cows are milked by the owner usually 
twice a day. No one ever salutes a man while so 
engaged ; if the milk stops, he will be accused of 
witchcraft. A visitor arriving at milking time will 
sit down and wait, neither he nor his host taking any 
notice of each other until the cow that is being milked 


Domestic Animals : Agriculture III 


is finished ; then the host will offer a greeting, but 
no further conversation takes place until all the milk- 
ing is over. Even his wife will not talk to a man 
milking. And women themselves do not milk as a rule. 
I was once called to see an old woman who had been 
terribly mauled by an enraged cow, which she had 
attempted to milk during her husbands illness. What 
enraged the cow I do not know, but the Konde believe 
that it was the sex of the milker, though men also are 
sometimes injured by enraged animals, usually a cow 
suckling her first calf. 

Milk that is not drunk fresh is put into large pots, 
and the milk of five to ten days added day by day. It 
is covered over very carefully, and eaten, when thick, 
along with potatoes, bananas, or other food. The 
whey, which is poured off when the pot 1s full, is also 
drunk for its cathartic properties. ‘The pots, of which 
a family with a large herd may have up to ten, are 
thoroughly cleansed after use with boiling water, and 
then laid on the fire for perfect disinfection. Some- 
times the milk is further hardened by being allowed 
to drip from a closely woven basket for several days, 
when it becomes hard and slightly tough, with a flavour 
like that of milk cheese. 

I have more than once proved the sustaining quali- 
ties and pleasant taste of thick milk prepared in the 
Konde fashion. On one occasion I was separated from 
my carriers, and, about two in the afternoon, having 
tramped since six in the morning, I stumbled into a 
village, and dropped exhausted under a great spread- 
ing tree. The chief, observing my exhausted condi- 


112 Domestic Animals: Agriculture 


tion, brought me a grass mat to lie on, and then ran 
to fetch a great dish of amasulu, as the thick milk is 
called. Only once have I eaten more welcome food ; 
when, having been obliged to make a long detour, I 
lost touch with my food boxes, and got two cobs of. 
soft, juicy maize from a garden I was passing through. 
That, I think, was the most delicious meal I ever 
made. 

Polling of cattle is practised, but only for special 
reasons ; if the animal is bad-tempered, or if the horns 
grow into the face, or if it 1s desired to give the cow 
a youthful appearance with a view to a good sale. 
The polling is done by specialists, but the cow, care- 
fully bound, is held by the owner himself. Fuine- 
looking horns are scraped to preserve their appearance. 
There is no gelding of bullocks, as the animals are 
never used for work of any kind; though European 
planters and others have proved that they respond 
well to training. 

A people so keen on cattle rearing have naturally 
developed some skill in the treatment of the various 
ills that afflict their stocks. Sympathetic magic plays 
a considerable part in the treatment. If a cow drops 
one bull-calf after another, the doctor will give the 
owner a medicine made into four great pills. ‘Then, 
if his own wife did not have a daughter as her first- 
born, the owner engages the services of a woman who 
did. ‘This daughter she takes upon her back, and, 
while the owner forcibly opens the mouth of the cow, 
she drops the pills into it. ‘aking another supply in 
her hand, she passes it over the back of the cow from 





A BANANA-LEAF UMBRELLA. 


In April there is an average rainfall of 36 inches. Children go to school, men and women go 
about their duties, protected—more or less—from the downpour, by a leaf taken from the 
nearest banana stem. 


a a79 
. ? 
wy 
4 










hes > ae Nese 
‘i ; ‘ he i a) S jt hes ee i co 








> oan P<2. ; F , 5 > . & 7 
pee uh hee! bok (4g +; Sore ae we F 
mad ay me yn ee at es 
ray oe ee. ae eee 


Domestic Animals: Agriculture 113 


neck to tail, saying, “‘ You will now give a cow-calf.” 
What remains of the medicine is put into the stall, 
and the next calf will be a female. A cow that kills 
her calf in dropping it is given a medicine which will 
prevent the recurrence of the fatality. Medicine is 
also given if the milk is not satisfactory in quantity ; 
and by rubbing in a medicine from tail to neck 
specialists claim to be able to tell whether a calf in 
the womb is male or female. 

A disease which does not yield to treatment is the 
work either of the spirits or of a sorcerer. Divination 
is resorted to, and the particular spirit operating 
having been discovered, the appropriate offerings are 
made, and the disease will now yield to treatment. 
If it is due to witchcraft, the chief is informed, and 
he publicly announces that if the animal is not well 
by next day, he will have the poison test applied to 
discover the culprit. ‘This, however, if done at all 
to-day, is done in secrecy, for the chief who permits 
the poison cup to be administered is liable to severe 
penalties. But so universal is the belief in witchcraft 
that the suppression of the poison cup is adduced as 
the cause of a great increase in the number of sor- 
cerers, and consequently of the general insecurity. 

Cattle are sometimes deliberately poisoned. A man 
has a case at court, and it goes against him, although 
he is convinced that he is in the right. He is ordered 
to pay a cow to his antagonist ; which he does, but he 
first poisons it with a slow-working drug, and the 
animal will die in a few days. The successful litigant, 


although he knows perfectly the cause of the death, 
H 


114. Domestic Animals: Agriculture 


rarely appeals, convinced, though without reason, that 
the magistrate will pooh-pooh his story. 

In 1920 a lake-shore chief was fined a large number 
of cattle ; and the animals, removed to the hills where 
the veterinary officer lived, did not thrive. ‘The reason 
is no doubt to be found in the different climate ; but 
the natives give two quite different ones: many of 
them were bewitched ; and others were given a slow- 
working poison by owners who resented the fine. 
But the fact that many natives willingly bought them 
when offered for sale seems to indicate not all held 
the two theories referred to. 

When an epidemic carries off large numbers of 
cattle, the Konde assume a fatalistic attitude. ‘There 
is nothing to be done: why worry? In 1894 immense 
numbers of cattle died of rinderpest. After learning 
by divination that neither spirits nor sorcerers had 
anything to do with it, the people put it down to 
Mwanjebe, a troublesome godlet of the neighbouring 
Kamanga tribe, against whom there was no appeal, 
and no protection. They assume the same fatalistic 
attitude to the interference of the white man, and a 
supreme distrust of all kinds of injections has arisen 
in their minds, since the widespread injections of 1918, 
when many of their cattle died. ‘The chiefs are 
credited with saying on that occasion, ‘‘ If the white 
man wishes to inject, let him inject! Why make him 
angry? Let the cattle die rather.” If this is true, 
it is a testimony to the immense personal prestige of 
the white man, but is hardly flattering to his veterinary 
skill. A warning was issued that the flesh of cattle 


Domestic Animals: Agriculture 115 


killed by rinderpest should not be eaten, but the 
injunction was disregarded, with fatal results, and 
again the fatalistic attitude in the presence of the 
all-powerful white man revealed itself: ‘‘ If we die, 
that is the white man’s affair. They wish to kill us.” 
It is useless to point to the recent increase of cattle 
in the district. ‘The reply always is that the deteriora- 
tion in quality, which began with the coming of the 
white man, and has continued ever since, more than 
balances the increase in numbers. 

In comparison with cattle, other animals are of 
small importance. Sheep and goats are reared in small 
numbers, and belong to the man, very much as cattle 
do. Fowls belong to any member of the family, and 
each owns what he sells them for. ‘There are many 
breeds of dogs, formerly used for hunting, but now 
mostly as watchdogs, in view of the prevalence of 
thieving. Dogs are as a rule treated with neglect, 
and pick up a living as best they can from the garbage 
around the doors. With a few exceptions they are 
cowardly brutes, possibly a natural result of their vile 
treatment. Occasionally one will come upon a man 
who has well-fed, well-cared-for dogs, and is very 
proud of their intelligence and courage, either in 
keeping off thieves or in tending cattle. ‘The story of 
the two dogs which were shown the limits within which 
their master’s cattle might feed, and kept them 
strictly within bounds, is not, perhaps, without 
parallel in other lands. 

There is a very remarkable tradition that in the old 
days of war, and especially during the Angoni raids, 


116 Domestic Animals : Agriculture 


a cow about to be delivered of a calf was rushed down 
to running water, and the calf, when delivered, 1m- 
mediately submerged. Then cow and owner ran for 
their lives, and when the scourge had passed over, the 
owner, if he survived, took the calf out of the water, 
resuscitated it, and let it go. The explanation given 
to me by a medical colleague of the conditions under 
which such a thing is possible, render it highly prob- 
able that if ever it occurred at all, it must have been 
very rarely, and even less in times of war than in times 
of peace. What is interesting, however, is the fact 
that the physiological possibility of it is known to the 
natives. I have not met anyone who has seen it done. 

Agriculture.—St. Paul would almost certainly have 
told the Konde that they were “ too religious ” ; not 
because he would have seen tokens of their religious- 
ness in the streets and villages; no mere passer-by, 
and no indifferent foreigner, ever sees that. One must 
look deep, and live long among them, before that 
side of their life reveals itself to him with any fulness. 
There is hardly an act of theirs that is not accom- 
panied by a ceremony of some kind, if that is religion, 
and to them it undoubtedly is. Agriculture is a highly 
religious occupation on that view, but hardly more so 
than many others. Leaving native Christians aside, 
the great majority of the people consult a diviner 
before beginning to hoe. He may say that all is well ; 
or he may discover that some spirit stands in the way 
of a good crop, and must be propitiated ; or that a 
certain piece of ground is bewitched, and no good will 
come of hoeing it until the spell has been removed. 


Domestic Animals: Agriculture 117 


If a spirit is to be propitiated, beer is poured out and 
petition made as follows : 


“Ye fathers, I am about to sow my seed. How 
can it grow 1f ye kill what I put into the ground? 
If ye are gracious to me, let me see the harvest.” 


Finishing his oblations with the usual squirting of 
water from the mouth, he next day sows his seed in 
confidence. If there are no obstacles from the spirits 
he does not pray. Why should he? There is nothing 
to pray about. 

The ceremonies are practically the same all over the 
Konde country, but many chiefs have special prac- 
tices of their own. A very picturesque ceremony is 
that of the chief Mwaisumo. When the early rains 
have fallen, and the ground has been hoed, chief and 
people go to the grave of the ancestral chiefs, carrying 
their shields of ox-hide. ‘The chief and his headmen, 
standing in rows, raise their shields above their heads, 
and Mwaisumo, taking water into his mouth, squirts 
it upwards, and prays for a good harvest. Immedi- 
ately all the people break out into rejoicing, dancing, 
shouting, blowing bamboo whistles, and drumming. 
‘The seed may now be sown. 

The first hoeing is ukusebera, gathering the heaps 
of dry rubbish and burning them. But even this is 
not done without ceremony. Every man goes to the 
doctor to get medicine, which is put into the biggest 
heap in his garden ; then, when the wife of the village 
headman has set fire to one of the heaps, which must 
not be one of those in her husband’s garden, all the 


118 Domestic Animals : Agriculture 


other women take fire from the lighted heap, and 
kindle their own, first setting the torch to the large 
heap which contains the medicine, the virtue of which 
is carried to all the other heaps as they are set alight 
one by one. 

There is a custom, now passing away, but still 
followed by a few, of throwing medicine into the 
ground as one hoes. Many use manure for fertilisa- 
tion, but the medicines I am speaking of have no 
manure qualities. ‘They are wnkota, something pos- 
sessing mysterious powers, the virtues of which are 
known by experience, but are not open to rational 
explanation. One of the best-known medicines of 
this kind is elephant manure, dried and set on fire, 
and the smoke allowed to spread over the garden. 
Where this is used it insures a bumper crop. 

Not even yet, however, is all ready, for the seed 
must be doctored before being sown. A medium- 
sized basket is taken, and plastered on the inside with 
the drug, which, of course, has been obtained from 
the local doctor, who at this season does a roaring 
trade. Into the basket the seed is put, mixed with 
more medicine, and then sown. ‘The object in this 
case is not, however, to secure a good crop, but to 
prevent the yield being interfered with. If even a 
sorcerer steals from that garden, he will sicken, and 
probably die; or a disease will eat up his lips, and he 
will stand revealed to all men for what he is, a garden 
thief, and, it may be, a sorcerer as well. 

Working parties are often formed for the hoeing, 
the group spending one day in each garden, and being 


Domestic Animals: Agriculture 119 


fed by the owner in each case. When a headman’s 
garden is being done, beer is provided, and the chief 
usually kills an ox when he has a party hoeing for him. 
The main crops are maize, cassava, millet, sweet 
potatoes, peas, beans, ground nuts, but many other 
food-stuffs are cultivated. Every village is hidden in 
groves of bananas, which need regular tending. Rice 
is grown for the market, and in the Kinga Mountains 
large quantities of wheat are cultivated. Every man 
owns his clump of bamboos ; many have a few kapok 
trees, some mangoes, one or two lemon trees; and 
some European fruits are slowly spreading to native 
gardens. A few cultivate kitchen vegetables, but only 
for sale to the white man. 

In a few places I have seen intelligently conceived 
irrigation, but never on a large scale, each man 
attending to his own needs in the matter. 

Growing crops must be protected from numerous 
pests. Boys are stationed by day to drive off monkeys ; 
straying cattle eating the crops involve their owner in 
damages: elephants, no rare visitors in some districts, 
are driven off by drum and horn and wild shouting 
when they pay no attention to the small sticks which 
are placed in a corner of the garden to keep them 
away. Pigs are very fond of growing maize; and 
where they are numerous, small huts, elevated on poles, 
are built in the gardens, and there the young men 
sleep and keep an open ear for the grunting which 
betrays the presence of the spoilers. ‘hen one may 
hear the long shout of the watchers, who add to their 
shouting the rattling of dried gourds strung on cords 


120 Domestic Animals: Agriculture 


stretched across the garden, and presently the pigs 
clear off, and there is silence again. Many kinds of 
game get part at least of their living out of human 
industry, and have to be laboriously guarded against. 

For smaller pests additional aid must be sought. 
Field mice and rats, indafu, a small locust-like creature, 
etubs, wireworms, and moles, work great injury, and 
ordinary methods of dealing with them are vain. 
‘Take, at sunset, a brand from the fire, and walk over 
the garden with it, singing “ Kuki Kyaubili?” 
Where is the Unseen God? and the pests will clear out. 

The first maize cobs are taken to the chief; then 
each head of a family presents a few cobs to his own 
ancestors ; twins also must be presented with early 
cobs, and it is only then that common people are safe 
if they begin to eat the new season’s crops. When 
the chief makes an offering to his ancestors, it is usually 
laid at the lupando, the place where the village trees 
stand. ‘The maize is eaten by mice, but it is credited 
to the “ lion ” which is the chief’s guardian (Chap. V). 
In some districts a perhaps more primitive ceremony 
is observed. With a following of little children, the 
doctor goes to the grave of the chief’s ancestors, and 
there roasts a few maize cobs, which he divides among 
the children; on their return, intimation is made 
that all may now eat the new crops. 

The food stocks in the barns are protected by a 
medicine, but this practice is falling out of use, though 
many still follow it. Ifa man is too poor to buy the 
medicine, he begs a handful of the protected grain 
from his better-off neighbour, confident that the 


Domestic Animals : Agriculture 121 


protective powers of the drug are securely transferred 
to his own stock. 

A man who does not hoe is held in supreme con- 
tempt, but he does not starve. His neighbours give 
him food, seizing the opportunity to add much sound 
advice. But lazy men are held in suspicion, for it is 
highly probable that they will become garden thieves. 

When there is reason to anticipate a general scarcity 
of food, the spirits are invited to confirm or dissipate 
fears. ‘I'he chief orders a collection of malesi (millet) 
to be made, each village headman bringing the con- 
tribution of his people in a small basket. One head- 
man is selected whose wife makes the beer, the be- 
haviour of which indicates the spirit’s answer to the 
question put. ‘lhe beer is poured into a large cala- 
bash, and thence into two cups, which are placed at 
the masyeto (graves of the dead chiefs). ‘There they 
are left for the night, and if in the morning the beer 
is found to have risen in the cups, filling them to the 
top, the harvest will be good; otherwise it will be 
bad. If the signs are good, all care is cast away, beer 
is made in great quantities, and drinking and feasting 
take the place of the previous anxiety. But when the 
spirits foretell a bad harvest the utmost economy is 
practised, and the chief is bound to see that no one 
makes prodigal use of his resources. 


CHAPTER IX 
Eating & Drinking 


HEN the white man travels he has a num- 

ber of men who carry his pots and pans, 

his plates and spoons, and all the para- 

phernalia of his travelling kitchen. His 
two dozen or so Konde carriers are well provided for 
if they have a couple of pots between them, or a piece 
of tin, usually a flattened-out food tin, on which to 
roast their maize as they squat chattering round the 
evening fire. What the white man wants with all 
that he gives them to carry, they do not know, and 
are not always interested. I was once seated in a 
remote village having breakfast, and a very simple 
breakfast at that; but I heard one of the villagers, 
numbers of whom were looking on from a distance, 
ask my boy, “How do you know what to give him 
next?’ What the boy replied I did not hear, but the 
interest in his operations was great. 

The carriers take no food for themselves. It is 
their business to look after the white man; it is his 
to look after them ; and I have always found that if 
he takes reasonable care to see that they are well fed 
and bestowed, they will not stint themselves in service 


to him. If nothing else is obtainable, they will be 
122 


Fating & Drinking 123 
content with maize roasted on a piece of tin, or a few 
potatoes roasted in the fire. I have known them, too, 
going perforce for a long time and quite uncom- 
plainingly, without salt, or any kind of relish for their 
food. For all these drawbacks are fully compensated 
for when the white man kills game ; then they gorge ; 
then the astonishing capacity of the native to take in 
food is seen at its best, or worst. A friend of mine 
once, far up in the mountains, killed an eland, and, 
leaving his men to deal with the carcase, went to his 
camp. His men kindled a fire at the ndkill, a sat down 
to feast ; when they returned to camp in the early 
hours of the morning, one man was missing, and his 
dead body was found where he fell, killed by his own 
immense greed, aided by a heavy rain which set in 
during the night. 

But while feeding arrangements 
primitive in the extreme, the ordinary household 


“Son safari’? are 


arrangements are by no means so. ‘The housewife 
operates with a great variety of pots, baskets, cala- 
bashes, and some women are celebrated cooks. A 
possibly mythical story of olden times tells how two 
chiefs went to war for the possession of a great 
woman, who was the wife of one of them, and was 
widely distinguished for wisdom and sagacity, and 
for her unusual culinary skill. She was secured by 
the attacking chief, and lived with him quite happily 
as his chief wife; an unusual honour, for it is a 
tule that captured wives never attain to that distinc- 
tion. 

The Konde, like most Bantu peoples, are noisy 


124 Eating & Drinking 

eaters. The loud smacking of many pairs of lips 
round the camp fire makes a quite surprising noise ; 
to which is added, especially if there is wyama (flesh), 
a sustained conversation carried on in a loud voice, 
making a din which is only ended by an angry shout 
from the European, who has himself long ago finished 
his repast, and cannot sleep in the uproar of the 
feast. 

If their table manners in this respect leave much 
to be desired, in others they are beyond reproach. 
They carefully wash their hands before, and their 
mouths after eating. For the hand, the right hand, 
which is the “eating” hand, is almost their only 
implement; but I have often watched my carriers 
make spoons of folded leaves, with which they neatly 
scooped up the cooked maize, or whatever else they 
were eating; and | have myself frequently drunk 
water scooped from a passing stream with a similarly 
folded leaf. 

The one great meal a day is a mighty feast, and one’s 
girth is considerably increased when it is over. Little 
children literally protrude in front, and their entire 
nakedness makes the protrusion very obvious. But 
while the Konde look forward to the evening meal as 
the event of the day, the practice of eating twice, or 
even thrice, is growing; and I have never known 
anyone being averse from eating, and that heartily, at 
any hour of the twenty-four. Eating by families is 
unknown, would indeed be bad manners, for the men 
eat first, and the women only after their lords are 
satisfied. A few Christian families are beginning to 


Eating & Drinking 125 
eat en famille, but the practice is not looked upon 
with favour. The open air meal in good weather 
of course gives way to the meal in the house when it 
rains. 

The far-stretching banana groves in which the 
villages are hidden indicate one of the favourite foods 
of the people. There are many kinds of banana, from 
the tiny “ Lady’s Fingers”? to the great plantains, 
half an arm long; and they are eaten in almost as 
many ways. Some are eaten direct from hand to 
mouth, peeled and corded, for even the small cords 
which adhere to the fruit after the skin is removed, 
are meticulously attended to; other kinds are cut up 
and cooked; some are ground into flour, of which 
porridge is made, or it is added to the flesh pot to give 
flavour to the soup. 

Maize is cooked in many ways: whole, mashed, or 
ground ; boiled or roasted ; mixed with other foods, 
or alone. The porridge made from maize flour is a 
greyish sticky-looking mess, wholly repulsive to a white 
man, and is often eaten without relish of any kind. 
Cassava, with the poison washed out by three days’ 
soaking in running water, then dried and ground into 
flour ; beans, with the skins removed by parboiling, 
and pressed between finger and thumb ; peas cooked 
without preparation; potatoes, often eaten with 
milk; these are main food-stuffs, but very many 
small herbs are used, especially for seasoning, and 
some very pleasant dishes are often served up to feed 
sick and well alike. 


126 Eating & Drinking 
Fish provide many a dainty dish. ‘The bulk of the 


fish caught is half roasted over a slow fire for preser- 
vation; and in that condition it will keep for many 
weeks. A great dainty is the umsusu fish, which is 
roasted and ground to flour, and hung up in grass 
bags in the roof, to be used as required. 

But the Konde is happiest of all when he has flesh 
to eat; perhaps because it is a rather uncommon 
event. His cattle are not primarily for killing ; 
primarily they are wealth stored up and increasing 
year by year. But he kills when there is a birth or a 
marriage or a death; for all these are occasions when 
one must not think of expense; and a number of 
Christians now hold birthday feasts for their children 
in addition to the occasions I have named. Generally 
the meat is preferred “high” ; and it is then cooked 
with banana flour, salt, animal fat, pepper, the latter 
an Arab introduction. A kind of pie is sometimes 
made, by cutting the meat into slices, and putting it 
in layers in a pot, the layers being separated by 
mbwiga leaves, a plant which has a curry-like flavour ; 
and the bottom of the pot is covered with maize to 
prevent the pie being burned. 

The Nyakyusa practise a method of preserving flesh 
which I have not heard of as in use elsewhere, though 
it may really be quite common. Besides the universal 
method of roasting the freshly killed meat over a slow 
fire, there is the running water method. ‘The fresh 
meat is placed in a sandy patch of running water, and 
left for about three months; but it may be visited 


Eating & Drinking 127 
daily for supplies, provided it is again quickly covered 
up with both sand and flowing water. All this must 
be done at night lest the hiding-place be revealed to 
others, and the flesh stolen. 

Bread is made of twice-ground maize with salt 
added. It is kneaded into loaves of about three 
inches thick, and placed in layers, interleaved with 
banana leaf, in a pot with maize in the bottom. This 
bread is often taken on a journey, and will keep for 
five or six days. Eggs are “scrambled,” with milk 
and salt, in a broken pot, but this is a European 
introduction. No young girl will eat hard-boiled eggs ; 
they produce a snake in the abdomen, which, of course, 
in turn produces barrenness. | 

Very unpleasant to our minds are some of the 
delicious foods the Konde rejoice in: flying ants 
eaten alive as they are picked up where they fall from 
their brief honeymoon in the air; crawling white - 
ants, a horrible mass of moving life; the Kungu fly, 
found on Lake Nyasa, whence it comes ashore in dense 
clouds, settles on bush and tree, and is shaken off into 
small baskets, to be taken home and baked into cakes 
while it is still fresh. In Bundali it is said that some 
still eat lion’s flesh, and once upon a time the crocodile 
was eaten at Karonga. Sorcerers are accused of 
devouring human flesh. A new grave is sprinkled 
with a powerful medicine which makes the corpse 
come up without disturbing the soil, and the ghoulish 
feast is enjoyed without leaving a trace of the deed 


behind. 


128 Eating & Drinking 


To-day there are many, even among the heathen, 
who say grace before food; only the older men now 
follow the ancient custom of laying aside a small 
portion of every meal for the spirits. But there are 
many superstitions nevertheless among young and old. 
There is a family at Itete which eats neither flesh nor 
fish, nor ground nuts, any of which cause violent 
vomiting. Others will eat fish but not flesh, and vice 
versa. Eland and bushbuck bring on leprosy in some 
families; goat brings ringworm; rhinoceros gives 
people a white skin; and hippo is very dangerous in 
the neighbourhood of lepers ; for lepers are buried in 
ant-hills, but they soon remove and betake themselves 
to the water, and enter the body of a hippo; so, if 
you eat hippo, you may be eating leper! Nyakyusa 
women will not eat a fowl, for fowls in the night 
cry out the names of ancestors! But a cock which 
gives a faint cry in the early morning is quite safe. 
There are many who have abandoned all these beliefs, 
but the vast majority of the people still cling to 
them. 

Drinking.—Beer is drink for men and gods; or if 
not for gods, it is a drink urgently demanded by the 
spirits. With few exceptions, it is offered at all 
religious ceremonies, but there is no special way of 
making the beer for the offering; it differs from 
ordinary beer only in that the cereal (malesi) from 
which it is made is contributed by all the people, 
while that used at an ordinary feast is made from 
males: provided by the entertainer. Even at these 
feasts, however, a little is spilled on the ground 





SIFTING. 
A turning motion of the basket brings the chatf and dust to the top, and a skilful throw casts 
it out, leaving the flour, which is now ready for cooking, 
GRINDING. 
As evening approaches, the rasping sound of stone on stone with the grist between, may 
be heard all over the village, as the housewives begin to prepare the evening meal. The flour 
falls into the basket in front, and more grain is taken from the one at the side. 





Eating & Drinking 129 
by each drinker as an offering to his individual 
ancestors. 

Great crops of millet (malesi) are grown every year 
for beer ; but if the other food-stuffs threaten to give 
out before the new crops are ready, the chief issues a 
prohibition against beer making, and the crop is used 
for ordinary food. Licences are now required for beer 
making and selling; but this regulation can only be 
enforced in the neighbourhood of a magistrate, and 
drinking goes on without restriction throughout the 
district. 

To make the full-bodied strong beer, malesi is put 
into a closely woven basket and placed in water for a 
night. In the morning, swollen to twice its previous 
size, it is put into a number of smaller baskets, and 
covered with banana leaf. In a few days it sprouts, 
and is taken out and spread in the sun, and when dry 
it is pounded into flour. Over the flour, again divided 
into a number of baskets, is poured boiling water, and 
the wnkese, as it is now called, is left to cool; it then 
stands for four or five days, when the final mixing 
with boiling water takes place. An expert comes to 
taste it when cool, and if he pronounces it good, the 
guests are called to the feast. The women, in long 
procession, carry the beer to the place of feasting, and 
sometimes drink along with the men, more often by 
themselves. 

As the night goes on prodigious quantities are con- 
sumed, and the noise becomes terrific. Drumming, 
shouting, singing, tramping of feet are the accom- 


paniments; and at Karonga I have had to get out of 
I 


130 Eating & Drinking 

bed at midnight to break up drunken revels, and drive 
to bed men who, though sternly refused permission to 
finish the beer, vowed themselves, in drunken senti- 
mentality, my eternal friends. But not always do beer 
feasts end so happily. As in other lands, some men 
become jocular in drink, others quarrelsome, and 
many a Konde beer feast has ended in a spear fight. 
Beer is an accompaniment of feasts given at births, 
marriages, and deaths; but occasion of that sort need 
not be waited for. The chief may give a feast at any 
time ; or a man who has been long away from home 
celebrates his return; or the hoeing season provides 
an excuse ; but with or without occasion, an immense 
amount of beer is drunk every year. 

Light beer is made in many ways. A favourite is 
made from sweet potatoes laid out to dry, pounded 
into flour, and mixed with flour of maize, cassava, or 
other material, cooked, and drunk when cool. Ground- 
nuts shelled and ground, put into small baskets with 
water, and allowed to drip dry, then mixed with 
malesi flour, and cooked, is a common drink; as is 
also a light drink made from the juice of sugar-cane 
similarly mixed and cooked. All these are non-intoxt- 
cating, and are taken along with food, or at any other 
time as a refreshing drink. 

Many of the more progressive chiefs are alive to the 
injury done by heavy drinking, and do all in their 
power to stop it; and native Christians who take any 
part in a beer feast are excluded from the sacraments. 
By the action of the Government in exercising control 
over beer, of some of the better chiefs, and of the 


Eating & Drinking 131 
Christian Church, a more enlightened public opinion 
is gradually being formed on the subject; but it is 
necessarily a slow growth. ‘There are a few chiefs who 
are opposed to drinking; there are others who are 
almost continually in a state of intoxication, and their 
example does much to perpetuate a ruinous evil. 


CHAPTER X 
Hunting & Fishing 


TRICT game laws have made hunting a 






thing of the past; or at best it is done 
secretly, when it is not a_ wild, excited 
scramble after some unfortunate animal that 
has wandered into the gardens in search of food. 
Before the white man took over the country, however, 
hunting was an important and regular part of the 
year’s work. ‘The diviner fixed upon a favourable 
day for setting out, and the whole community met 
for the preliminary ceremonies, when prayer was 
offered to the spirits, and through them to God. All 
quarrels must be made up before the hunters set out, 
and there must be no sin or strife in the village while 
they are absent, else they will not all come back alive. 
In hunting, as in every important act of his life, the 
Konde must be sure of the goodwill of the spirits, for 
a single angry spirit may spoil a whole season’s work, 
and render abortive every effort of the hunter, just 
as he may bring to nothing every other kind of activity. 
This permanent possibility of interference from the 
underworld is one of the fundamental facts of the 
inner life of the people, and real understanding of 
the native mind does not begin until this elementary 
fact has been grasped. 


132 


Hunting & Fishing 133 

Nothing was left to chance. ‘The spirits having 
been placated, the natural skill of the hunters must 
be reinforced by medicines. Indeed it is not improb- 
able that the native would say that the whole of his 
skill and success is due to medicines and ceremonies. 
The warrior goes out to battle armed and protected 
by prayers, drugs, and a good conscience ; equally for 
the hunter good morals, good medicines, are as im- 
portant as reliable weapons and a steady nerve. 
Unkota wa nyango, to ensure a good spear-throw, or a 
straight aim with the ancient rifle which some hunters 
carried, was rubbed into flesh cuts in the hands; and 
burungo, to make sure that the animal died quickly and 
without a long chase, was incised into the arms; but 
more frequently, and more effectively for this purpose, 
bulembe was attached to the spear. ‘This latter is a 
deadly poison, happily, perhaps, known only to a very 
few, for a single scratch is said to be fatal. It is said 
that the Germans tried unsuccessfully to secure the 
secret of its manufacture. ‘The poison is attached, 
in a leaf, to the blade of the spear, and the thrust into 
the flesh of the animal releases it, so that it enters 
the blood, and causes a speedy death. 

Women must not touch or go near hunting weapons, 
which are kept in the roof of the house. he spears 
must not be placed near the fire, lest the game, sniff- 
ing in the breeze the smell of smoke, deduce the 
presence of mankind, and make off. ‘The hunters 
must eat only freshly cooked food, for cold food 
destroys, as it does also for chiefs, the virtue of their 
medicines. Fatal results are sure to follow contact 


134 Hunting & Fishing 

with their wives before setting out ; and a wife who 
sins in her husband’s absence, will cause his death on 
the hunting ground. The smell of clothes, like the 
smell of fire, would drive the game away, and there- 
fore leaves only are worn while actually on the chase. 
Hunters thus fully equipped are called abarumba, the 
rank and file being mere abafwimi (drivers). ‘The 
hunt might last for four to eight weeks, and as the 
men did not return to their homes until it was over, 
huts were built in which they slept. The boy who 
did the cooking was not allowed to hunt, for his close 
contact with the fire would be fatal to success. 

Thus protected, the hunters went fearlessly to 
their work. In ordinary hunting there is no danger 
to speak of, though wounded animals sometimes turn 
furiously upon their hunters. But who can tell what 
sudden dangers the bush will spring upon one? I 
have passed within sound of the snoring of a gorged 
lion, and being unarmed, I could only pass on; I 
have been charged by enraged elephant and buffalo, 
and only barely escaped ; and not once or twice lions 
have crossed the path not far from where I was. Such 
dangers the native hunters faced, armed only with 
spears or old breech-loading rifles, no doubt further 
strengthened by the consciousness of the numerous 
medicines by which they were protected. ‘These, 
however, are incidental dangers: the actual hunting 
involved dangers knowingly and unflinchingly faced. 
I have myself been present when a native speared a 
wounded buffalo at a distance of a yard or two, 
dancing, waving his spear, and singing a song of 


Hunting & Fishing ¥35 
triumph before finally thrusting his weapon into the 
massive body, and then pushing it over with his 
hands. It should be added, however, that more than 
one bullet from my rifle had previously brought the 
great brute very near his death. A keen man will go 
close up, as indeed he must, to an elephant, before 
spearing it. 

Each tribe had its own hunting ground, and poach- 
ing was very keenly resented ; sometimes, in the long 
past, even leading to tribal war. The feeding ground 
of the village cattle was practical sanctuary for game, 
as hunting among cattle was not allowed, lest it 
should lead to quarrels with the owners. 

The commonest method of hunting was (and is) to 
dig pits into which the game was driven, and killed on 
the spears planted in the bottom. A great circle was 
formed, and the animals slowly driven into the area 
in which the pits awaited them, and those which did 
not fall into them were easily speared as they attempted 
to break through the ring of hunters. ‘Traps baited 
with salt or other bait, are still in use. ‘The trap is 
made of strong saplings, the uprights held in place 
by cross-beams, and bound together with bark rope. 
Over the entrance is suspended a heavy beam, the 
ropes supporting it being so arranged that the entrance 
of the animal releases the beam, and either closes the 
door or disables the animal. Open traps are set on 
game paths without bait of any kind. The animal 
pushes through the cords supporting a beam; the 
beam drops, and the victim may lie in agony for days, 
before the hunters return to see what has happened. 


136 Hunting &© Fishing 

For very small game, an even more cruel form of 
trap is used, which may often be seen in the bush. A 
stout branch is bent down, and held in place by cords 
which are released at a touch, and the unfortunate 
animal is suspended by the neck, to struggle until 
death comes to its relief, or the hunter who set the 
trap returns to secure the reward of his skill. For 
elephant and other large game, a heavily weighted 
spear was so fixed, high up in a great tree, that the 
game passing under it released the fastenings, and 
the spear dropped between its shoulders. Great care 
was taken to set the spear exactly perpendicular; a 
little water was poured upon it, and the shaft moved 
until the drip from the point was in exact line. The 
hunters were watching at a safe distance, and immedi- 
ately set out in pursuit of a wounded animal; occa- 
sionally, too, a man was stationed in the tree itself, to 
drop the spear with his hands as his quarry passed. 
Women must not go near such traps. 

Hippo were often killed in pits, digged near the 
lake shore or river banks, into which they fell as they 
wandered about in search of food. A more exciting 
game was to hunt them in canoes with spears and 
harpoon. ‘The harpoon was so made that when 
plunged straight down on the passing hippo, the shaft 
was released, and the toothed blade, with a rope 
attached, was firmly imbedded in the flesh. Then 
followed a scene which closely resembled whale hunt- 
ing stories. The hippo rushes off, then turns on its 
hunters, only to be driven off with spears as it comes 
close up to the canoe, charge and repulse being 


FE PETE age 


“te 8 


ie Seale 


3 





GAME TRAPS FOR SMALL ANIMALS. 


The cords holding the door are so arranged, that the animal, on entering, closes itself in, and 
escape is impossible. Dangerous animals are trapped in strong timber enclosures, the bait 
a sheep, or a goat, or sometimes an ox. 


CALICO-MAKING. 


Once widely practised by the Konde, but now almost obsolete. The native product is strong 
and durable. Dyeing in black and red is also practised. 





eye oes 
4 


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. As nw i] 
; ’ 
> i ,?h is 
; ‘ . re 0 
we 
' a“ od i Glig ' ; I 
4 et i: P 
‘ . 
, ars 
i . ; t , | . 
( ' 
a. f “i af! poet 
ety) \ / aw j x : in é i\ re) 
Ss. . Tie Cee eae 


Hunting & Fishing 137 
repeated until finally the great brute succumbs, 
perhaps far out on the lake, whence it is towed ashore, 
to be received with the triumphant rejoicings of the 
waiting crowd, which has been watching the fight 
from the beginning. But if the hippo comes up 
right under the canoe, the chase is over, and the death 
wail takes the place of the expected rejoicings. 

The bolder hunters lie in wait for the game, by 
water pools or game paths; or follow the spoor over 
miles of bush. ‘The leader is usually the most skilful man 
in the company. He knows the ways of all the animals, 
and the dangers that are likely to be met with ; it is 
his privilege, when the game has been overtaken, to 
throw the first spear; it is his duty to be the last to 
run when danger threatens ; he must see to the safety 
of the others before he thinks of himself. Many 
years ago, in 1912 I think, I was following up a 
wounded buffalo, with two native trackers. When the 
brute charged, as it did three times, I urged them to 
get on ahead, but they refused. ‘“* No,” they said, 
‘you are wearing heavy boots; our feet are light ; 
we will keep behind you.” 

A favourite method with some hunters is to lie in 
the water where the animals come to drink ; or if it is 
not deep enough, they dig a pit in which they lie, 
covered over with leaves and branches; when the 
game comes to drink, it is speared by the unseen 
hunter. 

All the flesh belonged to the hunters; but a sub- 
stantial share was given to the chief, who claimed all 


elephant tusks as his special property. ‘The leading 


138 Hunting & Fishing 

hunter received a cow, not as compensation for the 
tusks, but as a reward for his skill; the chief took 
the tusks without question; they were his wmwana 
(child). 

The flesh was roasted on the field, over a slow fire. 
Stakes were fixed in the ground, and a kind of trestle 
made, perhaps about two feet high, under which a 
great fire was kindled, and the flesh, cut into long 
strips, placed over it. In this condition it keeps good 
for months, but it requires prolonged cooking when 
it is to be eaten. This method of preserving the flesh 
is used to-day, when a European makes a good kill. 

Dogs were employed for hunting pigs and smaller 
animals. The dog chased the game, which, after a 
little, turned and chased the dog, and was led to 
where the hunters were waiting with spears. Dogs 
were used also for tracking, and are said to follow all 
but the largest animals. ‘There are large dogs of 
European breed, which chase leopards, usually in 
couples, but not always do both dogs return from 
the chase, and sometimes neither. 

An unsuccessful hunting season was a matter for 
careful inquiry ; for there must have been a cause, 
and it was the duty of the diviner to find it. Generally 
it was due to the never-failing trouble in the spirit- 
land, and when the diviner discovered the names of 
the individual spirits to whose meticulous ill-temper 
the hunting fiasco was to be attributed, arrangements 
were made for their propitiation. Beer was made, 
and each hunter took a small piece of the flesh of 
the animal he was specially expert in killing; and the 


Hunting & Fishing 139 
whole company repaired again to the hunting ground, 
where they built a hut under a large tree. The leader 
cooked native porridge, which was eaten along with 
beer and honey, when the spirits had had their due. 
A small heap of the porridge was set down with a 
little honey poured over it, and a small piece of flesh 
was laid beside it. Each ancestor was named, as his 
portion was laid out, and prayer was offered : 


‘“‘-Ve fathers, we have brought this beer and food 
for you. Why are you angry? Neither pig, nor 
bushbuck, nor any other animal falls into our traps. 
Give them to us, ye who give us all. In our gardens 
there is maize and millet and all things else. Why 
then do you hinder us now? Why are our traps 
empty? Be merciful to us. God be merciful to 
us, and go to the Basango ” (a neighbouring tribe). 


After this ceremony, the hunt is resumed with fresh 
courage and new hopes, and possibly a great success. 

Lion and leopard hunting is not, of course, pro- 
hibited by the game laws, and they are hunted or 
trapped with frequent success. A short time ago a 
leopard skin was brought to me, evil-smelling, and 
ruined by the spear-holes which marked a fierce 
encounter; and one of the hunters, showing me 
where the leopard had leaped upon him, begged for a 
little medicine to apply to his wounds. ‘The idea 
that his adventure made him an interesting person 
was not in all his thoughts. 

When a trap is used, it is made of very strong timber, 
and divided into two portions. In one the live bait is 


T40 Hunting & Fishing 

put, usually a sheep or a goat; the lion or leopard 
enters at the other end, and in doing so releases a 
beam which closes the entrance. The bait is quite 
safe, if it does not die of fright, for it may be some 
time before the villagers come with spears to kill the 
caged carnivore. But more exciting methods are in 
use. In 1922 a leopard killed a number of children 
near Ipyana. ‘Traps proving useless, the chief called 
for a great hunt, from which his men must not return 
without the body of the leopard. The brute was 
tracked, and encircled by a great multitude of men, 
armed with zsengo, a kind of hooked axe, with which 
they mowed down the grass as they slowly worked 
towards the centre of the ring where the leopard lay. 
With a great spring it escaped when they came near, 
but was again surrounded. This time it sprang at 
one of the hunters, seizing him by the arm, but in an 
instant all the others were upon it, seized it by legs, 
neck, body, wherever they could get a grip, and held 
it tightly upon the ground while others beat it to 
death with their clubs. 

Lions are killed in the same unflinching manner. 
In the same year, 1922, a lion killed many people 
near the lake shore. A hunt was organized, and the 
men, primed with much beer, followed the spoor. 
Infuriated by two spear-wounds, the lion turned and 
seized one of its pursuers, but a third spear-wound 
drove it off. Again it was surrounded, and the order 
was given not to retire. Once again a man was seized, 
but the lion was surrounded by his companions, and 


killed as the leopard was. It hardly needs to be said 


Hunting & Fishing 141 
that lives were lost in these dangerous adventures, 
but no compensation was given to the relatives, as 
the risk was taken by command of the chief for the 
good of all. A great feast was given by the chief on 
the return from the hunt with the carcase of the lion 
or leopard. If no one was killed, the rejoicing was 
great ; if there were casualties, the grief of a few was 
not allowed to damp the joy of the others, for a 
powerful public enemy had been disposed of, and it 
was an occasion for rejoicing. 

Bird hunting is sport for boys, not for grown men. 
A knobkerry skilfully thrown at a sitting bird some- 
times brings it down; but bow and arrow, which are 
used almost exclusively for this sport, secure a heavier 
bag. Where bird life is plentiful, bird-lime is smeared 
on trees, and numbers are caught in this way. Loop 
traps, similar to those used for small animals, may be 
found anywhere in the bush, not seldom with a 
rotting victim still hanging in them. Drop traps, of a 
construction similar to that used by boys at home, 
are also used. A broken pot or a small basket 1s 
supported precariously by an upright ; bait is placed 
within, and the bird, hopping on to a small platform, 
upsets the balance, and finds itself a prisoner. In 
suitable places small lakes are formed, and covered over 
with a network of loop traps, in which numbers of 
duck are caught. 

Two interesting methods are followed by the boys. 
In the evening, when the birds are returning to roost, 
half a dozen boys stand with branches over their 
heads, while others wave smoky torches, to avoid 


14.2 Hunting & Fishing 
which the birds settle on the branches and are skilfully 
caught. ‘The other method is to throw dust in the 
air, where birds are numerous, just after the young 
begin to leave the nests. ‘The birds, ‘‘ thinking it is 
rain,” settle on the ground and are easily caught. 

Fishing.—F ishing remains an important part of the 
year’s work for those living near river or lake. For 
river fishing, huts are built in the vicinity of the place 
where the traps are to be set, for the fishers live there 
as long as the season lasts. Ceremonies similar to 
those observed before the hunters set out for the 
bush, must be performed. Sometime in May, when 
the river is in flood, the chief fisher of the Mbaka 
dreams of fish, a sign that the time has come to begin 
the year’s work. A great quantity of wnkonda, fish 
poison, is prepared, each fisher, and there may be as 
many as fifty, preparing his own. When all are ready, 
led by the chief fisher, they go to the water, and 
trample the poison leaves into the bottom of the 
river. ‘The poison sickens the fish, which are then 
easily caught in the traps which are set for them with 
the mouth opening upstream. As soon as all the 
traps are set, the men lie down on their backs on the 
bank, and proceed to invoke the aid of sympathetic 
magic. ‘They open and close their mouths, gasp, 
in imitation of dying fish. ‘The probability of a 
good season is greatly enhanced by this process, 
which, though omitted now by many, is still widely 
followed. 

The traps are laid in rows right across the river, 
and are in the form of immense baskets with gradually 


Hunting & Fishing 143 
narrowing mouths, so arranged that when a fish 1s 
once in, it cannot get out again. Others are open 
above, so that leaping fish fall into them, and cannot 
escape. In the smaller rivers weirs or dams are 
formed, and the water diverted, with much labour, 
into another channel, in which the traps can more 
easily be set; this is the case especially in streams 
with stony bottoms. Fish spears are used, either for 
thrusting at random in the water, when fish are 
plentiful, or for stalking individual fishes. ‘The spear 
is formed with a long thin shaft, and small blades 
with two or three spikes. When a fish is caught, it is 
pulled off the whole length of the shaft, for the 
spikes would tear the flesh if it were taken off at the 
blade end. : 

Fish hooks are mostly pre-European, and barbless, 
though some are now made with barbs. ‘The bait is 
fish, flesh, potatoes or bean mash, which many kinds 
of fish are said to take readily. ‘The line as a rule is 
very long, perhaps as much as a hundred yards, and 
is supported by small sticks placed upright at intervals 
in the ground. Where crocodiles are numerous, the 
bait is thrown far out into the water, and the fisher 
retires to a place of safety, where he awaits the pull 
which indicates a fish at his hook. If he would secure 
it he must be smart, for the barbless hook will not 
hold it long. ‘This sport is indulged in mostly at 
night, a fire being kindled to attract the fish ; but as 
crocodiles and serpents may also be attracted, it is 
supposed to be somewhat dangerous, and to call for 
constant watchfulness. 


144 Hunting & Fishing 

Women have dipping baskets without top or bottom, 
which they dip at random, and when fish is plentiful 
they get a good catch. Boys prepare bunches of 
worms fastened to a cord and thrown into the stream. 
Sitting down on the banks, they sing or whistle to 
attract the fish. A sharp pull when a nibble is felt 
lands the unwary fish. 

Nets large and small are in use on the lake. The 
larger are furnished with stone sinkers and wood floats, 
and are operated very much as in Europe, a canoe 
feeding out the net, which is hauled in from both ends 
with the catch enclosed. ‘The smaller nets are some- 
times operated by one man, heavier ones requiring 
two ; and there are tiny dipping nets, of which a man 
will sometimes have one in each hand. Nets must 
be treated with medicine before being used. The 
Abakisi, a small tribe living at Matema near the north 
end of the lake, stalk the fish under water, and are 
said to catch all kinds in this way. 

In many places the first fish caught is not sent to 
the village, but is cooked and given to little children 
to eat, the bones being thrown back into the water. 
The idea is that this is one way of giving the spirits 
their portion; I have already pointed out that beer 
offered to the spirits is in some families poured into 
the hands of children, who drink it, though adults 
may not do so. And flesh offered at the family place 
of prayer (the zkiyinja) is similarly given next day to 
children, who are told that it is the gift of their 
grandfather. 

The remainder of the catch is dried over a slow 


Hunting & Fishing 14.5 
fire, in the same way as the flesh is treated by the 
hunters, and is carried by hawkers over the uplands, 
where they get a good price for it. River and lake 
supply a great variety of edible fish. My list, which 


is not complete, has the names of thirty-two species. 


CHAP TEREX 
Arts & Crafts 


S I write there is a church being erected at 
Kyimbila to seat about seven hundred and 
fifty people. It has fifteen windows, each 
with three Gothic arches, and six doors each 

with its Gothic arch. This work was done, with only 
amateur supervision, by native workmen, of whom 
only one has had any kind of training, all the rest 
being young men, some of whom had never handled 
a trowel, and the best of them had not had more than 
a few months now and again at similar work. A good 
deal of pulling down and rebuilding had to be done, 
but the building, as it stands, with its buttresses and 
arched doors and windows, has a dignified and satisfy- 
ing appearance. ‘The carpentry is being done with 
the assistance of a trained man from Nyasaland, all 
the other carpenters being men with a training, or 
lack of it, similar to that of the bricklayers. ‘The 
church is cruciform in shape, and the placing of the 
crown couples, if that is correct designation, was a 
triumph of ingenuity and patience. 

Now there is nothing in Konde arts and crafts to 
lead one to think all this a natural development of 


what they did before. For the remarkable thing 
146 


Arts & Crafts 147 


about these arts and crafts is their failure to develop 
at all. Hints and suggestions were there continually ; 
yet nothing ever came of them. Iron was digged, 
smelted, and made into tools, yet no better tool for 
digging the ironstone itself was thought of than the 
hoe. Cloth was widely made on native looms before 
the advent of inferior trade goods, and needles, with 
eyes, for sewing mats; but the idea of sewn garments 
did not penetrate the native mind. Burned clay pipes 
were made to direct the wind from the skin bellows 
into the blacksmith’s fire, but no one received from 
these pipes a hint of other possibilities. ‘The idea of 
the wheel, with its boundless possibilities, did not 
suggest itself to the Konde mind, nor, so far as I know, 
to the Bantu mind anywhere, although hints. of it 
were lying about, especially in the round tree trunks 
which were used as rollers when a canoe had to be 
dragged some distance from the forest to the water. 
At every point the native mind seems to have been 
waiting for the stimulus which was to come with the 
white man, and which has led to an awakening, the 
full extent of which is not realized except by thought- 
ful persons. For already, after the comparatively 
brief tuitional period of fifty years, Central Africans 
are replacing Indians as Government clerks, as hos- 
pital assistants, as engineers on river steamers, as 
telegraphists; they do all kinds of printing and 
bookbinding, carpentry, and building; and they fill 
positions of trust which a generation ago no one 
thought they would ever be capable of filling. ‘he 


Konde have not yet taken more than a small share in 


148 Arts & Crafts 


all this progress; but they have made a beginning, 
and they will go on. 

Among the purely native arts that of the black- 
smith is held in highest esteem; and the blacksmith 
himself is a man feared as well as honoured; and 
joked about as much as he is feared. I think if there 
were a local “ Punch” here, jokes about the black- 
smith would take the place of jokes about the plumber 
which in times past found so frequent favour with the 
editors of the actual “‘ Punch.” He steals both your 
time and your materials. He tells you that your hoe 
will be ready on a given day; you get your hoe days 
afterwards, and he has not used more than half the 
material you gave him; the rest will go to make 
another hoe, which he will sell, perhaps to yourself. 
“ As great a thief as a blacksmith,” “ as big a liar as a 
blacksmith,” are gross insults, not to the blacksmith, 
but to the man who is compared with him. ‘“ The 
blacksmith gets rich out of other men’s property,” is 
another saying indicating the morals of the great 
artificer. Yet he is feared also, and such jokes are 
never made in his presence, for he is in touch with 
mysterious powers, and his ancestor blacksmiths have 
their own ways of conveying information to him. 
Quite recently a native friend of mine was talking to 
his chief, when a messenger came in hot haste to say 
that a hoe had broken in the blacksmith’s hands. The 
blacksmith had gone at once to consult a diviner, and 
learned that the spirits were angry because no one 
was worshipping. ‘‘Go at once, therefore, and tell 
Mwaikuyu (the chief). Do you think heaven is 


Arts & Crafts 149 


empty?” Mwaikuyu said, ‘“* Why should we die? 
I will call the people to worship.” 

The most important products of the smithy are 
hoes and spears. Of the latter there are about a 
dozen different kinds, for war, hunting, fishing ; with 
broad or narrow blades; plain or with one, two, or 
three prongs; with long or short hafts. Axes are 
made for cutting down trees, digging out canoes, and 
all heavy work; some are slightly bent, and are used 
adze-wise ; a small one, very sharp, is used for smooth- 
ing woodwork and finishing it off. ‘There is also the 
isengo, a kind of cross between a hooked axe and a 
small scythe, used mostly for clearing bush land ; 
and a long-bladed axe, carried by chiefs over the 
shoulder, and serving only as an ornament. 

Knives are made of many patterns and sizes, with 
or without sheaths. A long spear-bladed knife is used 
for grass cutting, and a neat small strip of iron, sharp- 
ened at one end, not along the blade, is used as a 
razor. Arrows are not much used, as the Konde are 
not given to the use of the bow except for killing 
birds. Fish hooks were originally barbless, but some 
are now made on the European pattern. Needles 
are made for sewing mats; smaller ones for sewing 
breaks in calabashes, and others for sewing basket- 
work. Cow bells, tiny bells worn by little children 
on the ankles, anklets, and bracelets for women, 
complete the list. 

For lake-shore people, and those living near the 
larger rivers, the most important wood-working art is 
canoe making, and the average Konde canoe is a 


[50 Arts & Crafts 


fearsome thing. It is sometimes hollowed out, by 
burning and hewing, miles from the shore, even up 
in the hills, and has to be dragged down by long- 
stretching teams, who will be entertained to a beer 
feast when the canoe is launched. ‘The tree selected 
is not necessarily a straight one. A bend does not 
seem to matter, and some amazing things are afloat 
on the lake, and in regular use. But the Konde are 
not sailors, and compared, for example, with the 
Atonga, half-way down the lake, the number of 
canoes is very small indeed. ‘The Konde catch their 
fish by setting lines of traps across the rivers; only 
a few bolder spirits venture out on the lake with 
nets. 

Many years ago I was travelling with a team of hill- 
men, and not knowing the men I had to deal with, I 
crossed a deep river, swarming with crocodiles, by the 
first canoe that offered, leaving the men to follow, as 
I had no doubt they would readily do. But I had 
miscalculated. Not a man would enter the canoe, 
nor had the jeers of the villagers any effect whatever 
upon them. Finally I called for the canoe to ferry 
me back, with the intention of driving my reluctant 
highlanders, willy nilly, into it; but the threat was 
sufficient, and four or five ventured, planting their 
feet in the bottom, and stooping down to hold on to 
the sides with their hands. Half-way over, the canoe 
capsized, the men struggled, blowing and shouting, 
to my side of the river, and one or two villagers 
plunged in to retrieve my bed which was floating 
gracefully down the stream. ‘he rest of my carriers, 


Arts & Crafts 151 


notwithstanding the accident, accepted the inevitable, 
and were ferried safely across. 

For the rest, the variety of woodwork includes 
carved walking-sticks, with straight, knobbed, or bent 
handles ; chairs, stools, pillows, musical instruments, 
and wooden platters. In the Bundali district re- 
markably good Rurkee chairs are made on the Euro- 
pean pattern, with perfectly smoothed spars, and 
perfectly burned-out holes for fitting the parts 
together. The one in my possession might quite well 
have been made in a carpenter’s shop, but the only 
tools used were an axe and a knife, and a piece of iron 
for boring the holes. 'Toothed hair ornaments and 
small wooden dolls represent the finer work; and 
bamboo cups are decorated with pleasing patterns in 
poker work. 

More important than the woodwork is the ancient 
craft of the potter. There is, of course, no potter’s 
wheel, everything, from the immense pots, three feet 
high, down to the smallest eating dish, being formed 
by hand, built up, as regards the larger ones, by suc- 
cessive layers of clay, and finally hardened, after drying 
in the sun, by being put on a fire, while another fire 
is kindled inside. ‘There is a great variety of pots, both 
in shape and in size. The very large ones are used for 
storing grain or flour;. and some Europeans employ 
them for storing water. A well-stocked house will 
have up to twenty pots, for water carrying, for cook- 
ing porridge, fish, beans, flesh; and special ones are 
kept for beer making and drinking. The best clay is 
found at the north end of the lake, and from there 


152 Arts & Crafts 


one will sometimes meet with long strings of men and 
women, carrying ten to a dozen pots, hawking them 
round the upland villages, or offering them for sale 
at the local market at Tukuyu. The pots made at 
Matema are smeared on the outside with a dull red 
ochre, and the more artistic potters work patterns in 
red, with thin lines around the protruding middle, 
and herring-bone or crossed patterns from thence to 
lip and base. 

I once slept in a native house in which there was 
a double row of pots, one on top of the other, along 
two walls. I was told that they were there for orna- 
mental purposes, ‘‘ just as you white men have pictures 
on your walls.” 

Basket work is done everywhere, and a great variety 
of baskets are made. Immense :fituba, for storing 
grain, up to four feet high, and perhaps ten feet in 
girth, are to be found in almost every family. Smaller 
baskets for carrying goods of all kinds ; wide shallow 
baskets for sifting grain; others for serving food, and 
yet others for drinking beer. The latter are so closely 
woven that they will hold water, and are made from 
a fine grass, which is found only in certain regions. A 
new development of this industry is the making of 
articles to European, or native, order; hats, table 
mats, baskets with hinged lids and divisions inside, 
almost anything can be made if a specimen is given 
to the maker as a sample from which he may copy 
what is wanted. Basket work includes also the large 
and small fish traps in use at the lake or on the rivers. 

Net making is naturally confined to the lake shore 


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Arts & Crafts 153 


and the river banks. Large nets, with wide or fine 
mesh, are made with floats and sinkers attached, 
pulled at both ends by means of ropes. Ilitimbilo 1s 
a net used only at night, when the water is beaten 
with flat sticks to drive the fish into it. There are 
also small hand nets, and special nets made for catching 
special kinds of fish. 

Weaving is a very ancient craft, and may have 
begun with the weaving of mats, which are at present 
made from banana fibre, grass, reeds, palm leaf, and 
the tough outer skin of palms. ‘hese mats are used 
for sleeping on, laying out grain to dry in the sun, 
straining pounded maize, and a dozen other uses. 
Long grass or palm leaf mats are used by Europeans 
as carpets; and there is a good trade in palm leaf 
bags for carrying rice, and great mats for packing 
cotton for the European market. 

Very good cloth is still woven in the Igale district 
by the Safwa. The art was formerly universal among 
the Konde, but has now died out before inferior 
trade goods. At Igale the cloth is either plain white, 
or mixed black and white, though dyes for other 
colours are known. ‘These cloths make excellent bath 
towels, and a trade could be developed if encourage- 
ment were given. Bark-cloth is very extensively made, 
and there has been a recent revival of this industry 
consequent on the exorbitant price of European goods 
since the war. Women wear the long ilyabz or loin 
cloth of bark, and nothing else ; but, especially in the 
Igale district, complete suits are now made for men, 
wonderfully cut and sewn shorts and jackets, and 


154 Arts & Crafts 


sometimes long coats. ‘They look well for a few weeks, 
and then take on a dirty depressing appearance, and 
it is safe to say that with the reduction in price of 
Home goods bark-cloth will go out of favour. 

Leather work has not developed to any great ex- 
tent. Women use undressed skins for carrying babies ; 
and men, in remote districts, use them as aprons. In 
Poloto skins are sewn together to form garments, and 
in the Kinga Mountains the skins worn by the women 
are pleasingly decorated with shells, while the leg skins 
are skilfully cut into strips and used as ties, by which 
to bind the skin on the back. They are seldom worn 
in front, and the Kinga women go in furs as to their 
backs, while a small bunch of grass alone clothes 
the front. Shields, wide and narrow; blacksmith’s 
bellows of undressed goat skin; tobacco and snuff 
pouches, waist belts, caps, sandals; and long strips 
of hide for binding purposes, such as the haft of a 
spear, are all or nearly all the uses that are made of 
leather, if indeed the term leather should be used at 
all, as most of the articles named are made from 
unprepared skins. 

Beads are strung into pleasing patterns by using 
various colours, and are worn in strings or broad 
bands, on neck, forehead, arms, ankles, shoulders. 
Children often go clad only in a tiny apron of bead- 
work, and girls in the Kinga Mountains wear similar 
aprons until marriage. 

One European house in my neighbourhood 1s 
decorated with a frieze of crude representations of 
men on foot or on horseback, motor-cars, cycles, birds, 


Arts & Crafts 155 


animals, snakes, in astonishing variety, done in black 
or red on white ground by two native artists from 
Rungwe. Whether the ideas were supplied to them 
by the white man who owned the house, I cannot 
tell, but the execution is entirely native, and, although 
the total effect is weird rather than pleasing, it indi- 
cates possibilities which might be worth developing. 

If housebuilding be included in arts and crafts, 
then the Konde people take a high place. There 
are at present some remarkably good houses at 
Karonga, of four, five, or six apartments, built on 
the European model, with properly made doors and 
windows; and there is, not far from Tukuyu, a house 
at present being built, with two storeys, ‘T-shaped, 
the only materials used being the ordinary wood and 
clay. But the common Konde hut is a very high- 
class thing compared with the rude erections of 
tribes which have surpassed the Konde in other re- 
spects. Whether it be the older round type, or the 
newer square, there is a neatness and cleanliness in 
the Konde homestead that is sadly lacking in tribes 
that are wealthier, and more ambitious, but whose 
ambitions are only slowly reaching out towards 
improved dwellings. 


CHAPTER XII 
Amusements & Relaxations 


HAVE already said that the average African is 

a man with an abundance of spare time on his 

hands, and the situation suits him exactly. But 

even with him it may pall, and something more 
than mere lying in the sun must be found to fill the 
idle hours. A full account of the numerous games 
and amusements would fill a small volume, and a few 
examples must suffice. 

Association football is now very popular in many 
parts of Africa, and Konde youths take up the game 
with zest; but it can be enjoyed only at Mission 
schools, or at Government stations, or wherever there 
is a white man sufficiently interested to provide a ball, 
and to give some instruction in the game. ‘They kick 
from the ball of the great toe, as direct kicking with 
bare feet is impossible. ‘To score a goal is “ to give 
the egg ”’ to the losers, a phrase taken from one of 
their own games, where a rubber ball is knocked about 
with sticks by two sides, to attain a given objective, 
when the losing side is said to get ‘‘ the egg.” 

I was once present at a school concert to which 
audience and performers gathered from many different 


villages. ‘The programme, when presented to me by 
156 


Amusements & Relaxations 157 


the committee, contained no less than eighty-one 
items. I asked the committee to reduce it by at least 
a half, but after earnest wrestling with the problem, 
they returned and said that I must do the reduction 
myself. By the simple method of drawing my pencil 
through every second item, I reduced the programme 
to forty-one, but I did it to the mournful head-shakings 
of the committee. ‘The performance was a mixture 
of native songs, games, dances, and Christian hymns, 
and dragged its weary length far into the afternoon. 
But there was compensation. Eight or ten boys of 
about ten years old came on to the platform, and 
gave a “show” of a European doctor examining 
people for signs of sleeping sickness, regarding which 
there was a great scare at the time. The little fellow 
who acted the doctor was nothing less than an imita- 
tive genius, the kick with which he finally dismissed 
the examinees being done “to the life,” and it 
never failed to raise uproarious laughter in the great 
audience. 

Of purely native games and amusements the number 
is legion. 

Ingongwe is the large purple lump at the end of a 
growing bunch of bananas. It is rolled on the ground 
and pursued by yelling boys, armed with pointed 
sticks, each jabbing at it as it rolls, until one lifts it 
triumphantly on his stick. 

Tkimbenengwa. ‘Two pounding sticks are laid 
parallel to each other. One boy holds a third across, 
lifting and lowering it rhythmically, while another 
tries to hold it down by putting his foot on it. If he 


158 Amusements & Relaxations 


fails, the moving pounding stick comes down upon 
his foot, which is held between the two parallel ones. 

Ikyula, the frog. ‘Two sides at a small distance 
from each advance to meet, hopping like frogs, and, 
circling round each other, return to their places. 
Any who fail through exhaustion are the captives of 
the other side, and the game goes on until one side is 
captured, or all are tired out. 

Eya kalenda. Children form a ring, with one in 
the middle. All bend forward, hands on knees, and 
move round in a shuffling manner in a circle. ‘The 
one in the middle acts as leader; if he turns to the 
right the others do the same; if to the lett they 
follow suit. The leader sings “‘eya kalenda,” and the 
others respond with “ nyama we.” After a little the 
leader claps hands over his head, the others following 
and singing the while. 

“ Turwe na Babemba”: let us fight the Abemba. 
Two rows of boys kneel facing each other, hands on 
ground, heads down ; all sing “ Turwe na Babemba” 
twice, beating the ground with their hands. At the 
second singing one side advances on hands and knees, 
erowling, to drive back the enemy; then the other 
side advances to fight the first, and so on. 

Pamba nsilili is not unlike ‘‘ See the robbers passing 
by ” or “ Oranges and Lemons.” ‘I'wo of the tallest 
children stand facing each other, hands raised and 
meeting to form an arch, a gentle clapping being 
kept up all the time. ‘The others form in line accord- 
ing to height, and sing “FE / yuba nsili” ; the two 
forming the arch respond with “ Pamba nsilih.” 


Amusements & Relaxations 159 


Then the line advances and passes under the arch 
singing. ‘The last to pass through is usually held, 
but sometimes escapes. 

Of such games there is almost no end, and new ones 
are continually being invented, many of them imita- 
tive of something introduced by the white man, 
European peculiarities being specially liable to this 
hilarious form of flattery. I have seen boys imitate 
the peculiar walk of Europeans, to the intense joy of 
the onlookers. For, let it be repeated, to the younger 
generation the white man is no longer a little tin god, 
or any other kind of god. He is fully respected for 
all that the native considers worthy of respect (and 
their ideas do not always harmonize with ours), but 
if he is laughable for any reason, he need not doubt 
that he is laughed at. 

Dancing is the principal relaxation of the Konde, 
if the violent exercise which it sometimes involves 
may be called relaxation. It is indulged in with great 
zest, and, as the night advances, with complete 
abandon, moral and physical. ‘There is not much 
that can be called religious dancing: a children’s 
rain dance, a pestilence dance, and the wild leaping 
and shouting, with horn and drum, which young and 
old engage in at times of eclipse or earthquake. But 
anything may be made the occasion of an impromptu 
dance: the arrival of a European, especially if he is 
popular ; the killing of lion or leopard ; the killing of 
much game by a European; the return of friends 
from a journey ; or a score of other reasons, some of 
them trivial, such as the laying down of a load which 


160 Amusements & Relaxations 


a man has been carrying until he is almost exhausted ; 
but he has always enough strength in hand to enable 
him to give a few leaps of joy when he is at last set 
free from its weight. 

The ordinary dance usually takes place at night. 
‘The dancers are summoned by the sound of the drum, 
which is an invitation to all who care to join. The 
general characteristics of all dances are movements 
and posturings of the body, usually two or more 
dancers, sometimes only one, advancing to the centre, 
making a few posturings or leaps, and retiring to give 
place to others, while the drums sound continuously, 
and the shouts of the dancers increase in vigour as the 
movement reaches its climax, until the noise becomes 
terrific and indescribable. And yet the older people, 
long past the dancing age, sleep soundly through the 
din ; though occasionally an angry man will get up 
and drive away a few boys and girls who have got up 
an impromptu dance after their elders are in bed. 

Ikimbimbi dance. Men and women stand in 
opposing lines, the men carrying spears, the women 
rods. ‘I'wo or three drums are beating, and at a 
signal all break out into a song, while simultaneously 
the lines advance to meet each other, and then fall 
back. ‘Two men and two women dance into the 
centre, retire, and give place to others, until all have 
danced. ‘The dancing is a mere shuffling of the feet 
with posturings, but the men and women do not 
touch each other. The singing is a recitative, with 
shouts intervening, and the drums beat softly or 
furiously in harmony with the singing. 


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Amusements & Relaxations 161 


Ingwata. ‘Two lines as before, men and women 
advancing and retiring, while all the others keep up a 
continuous tramping more or less in time with the 
drums. 

Amasere. Each dancer has half a dozen reeds filled 
at the top with sand, which they beat on the ground, 
while the lines advance and retire, and a man and a 
woman approach the centre, dance round each other, 
and give place to the next couple, singing and shouting 
as before. 

Tkindundulu. In this dance there are no drums, 
but the opposing lines keep up a continuous shouting 
or singing; two men advance to the women’s line, 
one of whom comes out to meet them, selects the 
more handsome, and retires with him to her own 
line, which dances round him, laughing the while at 
the other, and later dancing round him with mocking 
songs. ‘I‘wo more men face the ordeal, until all have 
been through it. 

Ikinanda. No drums, but each dancer has tiny 
calabashes, filled with sand, on the ankles, and two 
streamers of bark rope flowing out behind. ‘The 
line advance and retire, giving place to couples who 
dance in the centre, while the others shout and clap 
hands. ) 

Tkisepe. Each dancer has pieces of cloth or bark 
rope, one before, the other behind, and a reed in the 
hand ; the dance consists of heaves of the body which 
cause the streamers to be thrown out before and 
behind, while the drums beat and the song goes on, 


as each couple fills the centre for a moment. 
I, 


162 Amusements & Relaxations 
Ikikweta. This a highly objectionable dance, 


better not too minutely described. ‘There are four 
drums and uproarious singing and shouting. ‘The 
dance is of recent introduction among the Konde, 
and is held late at night. ‘The chiefs try to put it 
down, but without much success; and there are 
other very evil dances, which no decent people will 
have anything to do with. Such dances usually come 
like an epidemic, spread rapidly over a whole district, 
and lead to great moral injury, until they are put 
down by vigorous chiefs, or die out of themselves, 
until the epidemic comes round again. Very frequently 
these evil performances go on the whole night, with 
terrific noise, and so determined are the dancers, that 
respectable people are afraid to interfere, lest an 
unmerciful handling should send them back to their 
homes bruised and bleeding. But the approach of a 
white man sends the dancers rushing off to hide in 
the bush, as I have often found at all hours of the 
night. 

Of games of skill the most important is a kind of 
draughts game, an Arab introduction. ‘Thirty-six 
holes are made in the ground; the players, two or 
four in number, have small stones which they move 
from hole to hole, until one side is declared winner. 
I do not understand the game, and shall not attempt 
to describe it; but a very complete description is 
given in “The Ila-speaking Peoples,” by Smith and 
Dale. 

A favourite intellectual exercise is the propounding 
of riddles, of which there is a large stock, and new 


Amusements & Relaxations 163 


ones are always being added. ‘The following are a 
few examples : 


My house has no doors? An egg. 

My hen lays her eggs among thorns? A pineapple. 

When I returned from my walk, I took the cow by 
the tail? A long-handled drinking calabash. 

By day or by night, by hill or by plain, it is hard 
work? Walking on slippery ground. 

I hoed a large garden, but when I gathered the crop 
it did not fill my hand? MHaircutting. 

All my children have red hats? ‘Uhe finger-nails. 

It has neither feet to walk with, nor hands to seize 
with, yet it devours everything? Fire. 

The chief’s cup is empty? In comparison with the 
lake, which is always full. | 

Feet which have no toe-nails? ‘The feet of a 


table. 


The “‘ wisdom of the fathers ” is expressed in short 
pithy parables, of which the following are a few 
examples : 


A familiar road needs no sign-posts. 

If one fish (in a basket) rots, they all rot. (Beware 
of evil company.) 

The tongue has no bones. (Beware of talkative 
people.) 

The liar has only a short way to go. (Your sin will 
find you out.) 

Righteousness injures no one. 

Little by little, and the cup is filled. (Much drop- - 


ping wears away stones.) 


164 Amusements & Relaxations 


A hired man eats his own share and that of others. 
(Be self-reliant.) 

The right hand does not cut off the left. (Be con- 
sistent.) 

There is no blessing in hurry. (Think before you 
leap.) 

If you would get something from under the bed, 
you must kneel down. (Honour to whom honour is 
due.) 

If you would get honey, you must use fire. (Take 
the bull by the horns.) 


Tales told to the children, and to adults, are as 
numerous as proverbs and riddles, or even more so. 
Many of them have come down the generations, but 
others are of quite recent origin; those which con- 
tain references to Europeans being necessarily late 
compositions, though in a few cases they may be old 
stories revised to suit modern conditions. At the 
concert referred to at the beginning of this chapter, 
one of the items was a hugely comic account of a 
native’s adventures among Europeans, which quite 
convulsed the audience, though the white man was 
not always represented as getting the worst of the 
situation. ‘The reciter, however, modestly disclaimed 
authorship, and assured me that he had received it 
from others. In any case the ability to tell a vivid 
story, and to show the humorous side of life, was quite 
striking. 

These stories cover every aspect of life, and each 
one has a moral, not always obvious to the European 
listener, but apparently quite clear to the people 


Amusements & Relaxation 165 


themselves. ‘They form part of the education of 
every child, and of the admonitory stock-in-trade of 
all parents of growing boys and girls. A judge will 
use one to give point to his decision ; a man pleading 
his case at the native court will illustrate his plea with 
an apt story. ‘There are men and women whose large 
stock of tales, and skill in relating them, make them 
welcome in every gathering ; but anyone, on occasion, 
will tell one. 


Tue TortToisE AND THE HEDGEHOG 


Once upon a time, when there was a famine, the 
Tortoise went to a far country to buy food. He 
found it in abundance, and made up a load; but on 
his way home he came upon a tree which had fallen 
across the path. So he laid down his load on the path, 
and followed the tree to see how big it was. When he 
was satisfied, he returned to pick up his load, but 
found that the Hedgehog had carried it off. Then 
the Tortoise said, “‘ My friend Hedgehog, why have 
you taken off my load?” ‘‘ Your load!” said the 
Hedgehog. ‘‘ Why did you leave your load on the 
path? No, I have beaten you.” ‘he Tortoise went 
at once to the judge, who summoned the Hedgehog ; 
and when he heard the facts he gave judgment for 
the latter. ‘The judge said to the ‘Tortoise, ‘“‘ You 
have lost the case. Why did you leave your load on 
the path? You are a fool.’? So the Tortoise went 
home, and the Hedgehog went off with the load of 
food. 

After a long time hunters went out to hunt the 


166 Amusements & Relaxations 


Hedgehog, who, to escape from them, backed into a 
hole in the ground. And in that hole who was there 
but the ‘Tortoise, who when he saw the tail of the 
Hedgehog coming in, promptly bit it off close to the 
bone, and said, ‘‘ Now [ve got you!” ‘The Hedge- 
hog was terribly angry, and went off to the judge. 
The judge summoned the Tortoise, who said, “* Why 
did he separate himself from his tail in that way? 
The rest of us are all of a piece.” And the judge 
said, “‘ You are a fool, Hedgehog. Why don’t you go 
like other people? You have lost the case.” 


CHAPTER XIII 
Konde Warfare 


HE men of Munsoso were hunting, and 

came to the land of Mwakarobo with their 

“bag.” Mwakarobo’s men crept up while 

the tired hunters were resting in the shade 
of the trees, and carried off the birds. 

“Why do you steal our birds?” demanded the 
angry hunters. 

“We don’t talk with fools,” sneeringly replied the 
others, as they went off with the booty; “get off 
home, or one man of us will chase the lot of you.” 

Home the hunters went, and great was the uproar 
in the village when the tale was told. “I am an old 
man,” cried the indignant chief, “but we must 
fight.” 

“Don’t speak of it,” said his sons, “let the spear 
talk.” 

Next day the fighting men went forth at dawn, 
and burned a few huts in Mwakarobo’s village, from 
which the defenders, unable to prepare a defence, 
had removed all the women and cattle. A few days 
later, having made an alliance with some neighbouring 
chiefs, Munsoso attacked in force, and drove Mwaka- 
robo out of his country, which to this day he has never 


recovered. 
167 


168 Konde Warfare 


Not all Konde wars arose from such trivial causes, 
or had results so trifling ; but much of it was of this 
petty nature: wife stealing, cattle stealing, insults, 
civil war to drive out an unpopular chief, were among 
the causes. More important were the wars waged to 
acquire new territory, as in the wars of the first 
Chungu, and the conquests made by the Sango and 
Kinga chiefs some generations ago. ‘There were, 
properly speaking, no religious wars, nor was there any 
desecration of sacred places; but there is an interest- 
ing tradition of a tribe which determined to accept 
Mbasi as God, contrary to the decision of the other 
tribes, and was severely defeated in battle; and 
Mbasi, about whom more will be said in another 
chapter, has ever since been regarded as a deceiver. If 
there is anything in the tradition, it indicates a cer- 
tain amount of loose cohesion among the tribes. 

Approaching war was foretold by prophecy and by 
portent. The abakunguluka (prophets) declared that 
for the sins of the people war was coming; the same 
terror was foretokened if the horns of the new moon 
were not of equal length, or if the cattle bellowed 
at night without obvious cause. But when a chief 
wished to go to war he held secret council with his 
headmen and official advisers, the objective of the 
war being almost always to “eat”? the cattle of another 
chief. Usually it was agreed literally to sleep upon 
it. If one of the dreamers had a war-dream, as he 
might very well have, he told the others, and all 
together went to inform the chief. In these dreams, 
the progress of the fight was foreseen, and the result, 


Konde Warfare 169 


including the individuals killed, was told to the chief. 
If the dream was favourable, confirmation was sought. 
The chief took his zebra tail of office, poured oil into 
it, and hung it up in the house of his chief wife. If 
during the night it exuded cattle dung and blood, 
the sign was good; if blood only, it was bad. Blood 
indicated the death of men, but that was of secondary 
importance if the dung was there which indicated 
spoil in cattle as the result of victory. Along with 
the tail was hung up the chief’s spear, which now 
gleamed and glittered like fire in the night, while the 
tail moved about with a swishing sound, indicating 
that the spirits urged battle. All this took place in 
the presence of the chief and the principal medicine 
man only; and their report was published in the 
morning, when the blowing of a horn summoned all 
males to the meeting-place. ‘‘ My children,” says 
the chief, “‘ we are hungry. Let us eat the cattle of 
so and so.” But he gives the name, not of the real 
point of attack, but of some other chief living in 
another direction; for there was always the possi- 
bility of traitors in the community, who would carry 
warning to the enemy. 

A wild scene of hurry followed. Spears were 
collected and sharpened, defects attended to, new 
hafts attached. ‘lhe shields were examined and 
strengthened if necessary. If there was a blacksmith 
in the village he was besieged by warriors whose 
weapons had become rusty or useless, all eager to 
equip themselves for the spoil. But man and weapon 
are alike useless until they have been given power and 


170 Konde Warfare 


protection by the medicine man; and the armed 
warriors, standing in rows or circles, were sprinkled 
with medicine from a huge pot, rendering them and 
their weapons irresistible. In the rising of 1906 in 
the Songea area, it is said that the fighting men were 
so confident of the power of the drugs that they rushed 
up to the mouths of the German guns, only to perish 
there by the bullets which they believed would be 
turned into water. 

Besides the publicly administered medicine, a more 
powerful drug was to be had for a fee; and the chief 
himself was armed and protected at all points in this 
way. One medicine ensured that his spear would 
find the heart of an enemy ; another that the enemy’s 
spear would fall short ; a third he chewed as the fight 
went on; and a few very great chiefs possess a medi- 
cine which enables them to remove a fatal wound to 
a non-fatal spot. Those who could obtain it attached 
another medicine to the spear handle, and some 
carried a charm on their shields. 

Fighting men carried spears numbering from six 
up to twenty; and the greater the number the 
bolder the hero, for a large number of spears indicated 
a determination not to run until every weapon avail- 
able had been thrown at the enemy, or otherwise 
disposed of. Great heroes were followed by slaves 
who carried additional supplies of weapons. Some 
had wide shields of ox-hide, and others had narrow 
strips strengthened by slim bamboos. On their heads 
they wore the zkipuhili, a plume of red and black 
feathers, the capture of which from an enemy was 


Konde Warfare 171 


the great ambition of every warrior. Arms, legs, and 
waist were partially covered by strips of hide with the 
hair attached, but these were meant to give a wild 
appearance, not to protect the body. 

No man went out to battle with an unsettled quarrel 
hanging over him; the ancestors of the other party 
to the quarrel would see to it that he did not return. 
And the chief must be free from offence. One who 
proposed to go to war with other men’s wives on his 
conscience, was sternly told by his councillors that 
his conduct made victory impossible, and he must 
make such amends as the law demanded. Except in 
cases of hurried attacks, such as the march of Munsoso 
to avenge an insult, all household fires were extin- 
guished, and new fire obtained by rubbing. The 
women threw away their old bark-cloths, and used new 
ones. Just before setting out the chief went to the 
house of his first wife and prayed to his ancestors to 
grant him success. "The war dance which followed 
the sprinkling with medicine might last for two or 
three days, and finally, armed and protected by 
weapons, medicines, prayers, and a good conscience, 
the warriors went forth. 

The fighting began when the opposing forces came 
within a spear’s throw of each other. Here and there 
a great hero stood out to hurl insulting language at 
“come on,” and be 
scattered by his single arm. When the fighting 
became close, stabbing took the place of throwing, 


the enemy, challenging them to 


and if a very few were killed on either side, the losing 
side retired. But only for a short distance; for a 


72 Konde Warfare 


hero stood out, and called the others to rally round 
him, and a few desperate men would drive back the 
enemy. And so the battle swayed to and fro, until 
one chief considered that his men had had enough, and 
made his submission ; or perhaps the fight was renewed 
next day when the tired men had rested. But so long 
as the chief went on blowing his isiba (usually a small 
horn), the battle went on. The great war horn was 
blown continuously, and the ililonge, a bamboo whistle 
with a penetrating note, made itself heard above the 
din. 

Behind the fighting-line were the old men, one of 
whom held the lwsero, a basket with a great selection 
of powerful medicines, very sacred, and of vital 
importance. If it was taken by the enemy, it was 
hoisted up for all to see, and if it was finally held by 
them, the dynasty to which it originally belonged 
died out. It was shaken by the old man who held it, 
and was carried forward or drawn back, according as 
the enemy retired or advanced. If the chief was an 
old man he did not enter the battle, but took his 
place in the rear, praying; if he was defending his 
home, he prayed to God and to the spirits; if he 
was the aggressor, he left out the prayer to the 
Deity ! 

After the men went out to fight, the women sat 
silent and unwashed in the villages until they returned, 
carefully avoiding quarrels, which would kill the 
husbands of the participants. ‘They were stripped 
quite naked, ‘‘ to give lightness of foot ” in case the 
enemy forced an entrance. Women were never killed 


Konde Warfare 173 


in war, for the victors were enriched with the cattle 
that went to redeem all captured wives or daughters. 
Nor were they taken as wives by the victors, although 
there is at least one well-known case where a woman 
was the sole objective of a war. 

The dead might be buried where they fell, or 
brought home. ‘The return of the host was awaited 
by the women in silence if the result of the fighting 
was not known to them. Each wife or mother recog- 
nized husband or son among the returning brave, but 
if one was told that her husband was coming on 
behind in another company, she knew that he was 
dead, and that his body was being brought home. It 
all returned in safety, and that sometimes happened 
in these far from desperate encounters, the women 
and girls set up their shrill cry, as exciting to an 
African as the pibroch to a Scot, and ran alongside, 
clapping and shouting in joy. ‘The night was given 
up to feasting. The captured cattle were divided by 
the chief, lions’ shares going to those who distinguished 
themselves in the fighting. ‘he defeated chief, if he 
had any cattle left, also gave his men a feast, for they 
must not be allowed to lose heart over a single failure, 
and no doubt there was much boasting on both sides. 
If the sacred /usero with its medicines was taken from 
the enemy, it was put into the house in which the 
victorious chief kept his ifingira, the very powerful 
medicines by which his authority was (and is) upheld. 

Cowards were held in supreme contempt. But a 
coward is not a man who runs away ; all do that as 
the struggle sways to and fro; a coward is a man who 


174 Konde Warfare 


does not enter the battle at all, but hangs in the rear 
with the old men, afraid to take his part in the fight ; 
or who fails to answer the rallying cry and help to 
turn the tide of battle. ‘Tokens of contempt were 
heaped upon him. He got no share of the spoils. 
When the feast was going on, a piece of roasted flesh 
was handed to him on the burned end of a stick taken 
out of the fire; if he dropped it he was beaten, the 
final disgrace. In very bad cases, his house was pulled 
down and his wives given to other men. But one who 
was ordered by the chief to keep out of the battle 
was not disgraced in this way. He did what he was 
told. 

The spoils of war, which were practically always 
cattle, belonged to the chief. If a man captured ten 
head, the chief might give him back five or less 
according to favour or valour. From a headman he 
would take only one or two; and out of all that fell 
to him he gave rewards to those who had distinguished 
themselves in the fighting, but had not taken cattle. 
No prisoners were taken, and the seriously wounded 
were killed. ‘To let them live was to increase the 
number of future enemies, and to gain a reputation 
for softness which did not make for security against 
attacks from other quarters. And yet there was a 
pleasant kindness too; a man who had a friend killed 
on the other side went freely to the enemy’s country 
to mourn for him, and no one thought of molesting 
him. ‘The frightful orgies of slaughter in which it 
would appear that some Bantu tribes indulge, are 
unknown in Konde warfare. ‘The interminable death- 


Konde Warfare grb 


roll of the Great War was a terrifying revelation of the 
unyielding nature of the Europeans in a quarrel. 

Individual chiefs had special methods of securing 
victory. Mwamakula’s wife, when her husband 
marched out with his forces, sat on a live sheep as 
long as the fighting went on: so assuring good luck 
to her husband in taking cattle, and preventing them 
running away when taken. Another wife sat on a 
cooking pot, to keep the enemy in a state of security 
while the warriors were closing in on them. ‘They 
would go about as usual, unaware of danger, cooking 
and eating, until the storm burst, and there was no 
hope of defence. His sister had a lusero similar to 
the one carried into battle; and one of his old men 
lay down on the path, each soldier stepping over him 
as he passed on. While the fight was being waged, 
this old man sat on his haunches and pulled himself 
forward in that position, the effect being to make the 
enemy run. ‘The dusero was carried hereditarily by 
Méfwimi, and when he laid it down it moved forward 
of itself as the enemy retired. 

In the north there was a great prophet, whose 
presence in the battle always assured the victory to 
his own side; but if he retired, even for a moment, 
the battle turned, and he was brought back, by force 
if necessary. 

‘Two great wars still stand out in the minds of the 
people: the victorious march of the Angoni, and 
the slaving invasion of the so-called Arabs. Both 
these enemies brought with them methods of fighting 
unknown to the Konde, who fled before the Angoni, 


176 Konde Warfare 


driving cattle and carrying what they could carry < 
men and women flying naked for greater swiftness : 
until the great Sango chief Merere, who is said to have 
had three hundred guns, inflicted a severe defeat on 
the invaders. After that the Konde made a few 
feeble attempts to stand, but they came to nothing, 
and the Angoni passed like a scourge through the 
land. Against the Arabs a better fight was made, but 
it was with the help of the white men who at that 
time began to enter the Konde country. 

‘The Konde were and area timid people. The terror 
of the Arabs has passed, but the fear of the Angoni 
is probably a present fact. In August, 1914, some of 
the leading men at Karonga came to me. ‘‘ All you 
white men,” they said, ‘* will be summoned to fight 
in your own country, and we shall be left without 
protection from the Angoni.” I tried to reassure 
them, but without success. ‘* No,” they said, ‘‘ three 
days after you go they will be upon us, and take away 
all our cattle as they did before.” Possibly a more 
courageous spirit now obtains. A band of Angoni 
were enlisted for special work at Karonga in the early 
months of the war, and showed themselves so averse 
from anything like danger, that the reputation of the 
whole tribe, quite undeservedly, went down to zero. 
“The fear of the Angoni,” said some Konde to me at 
that time, “is gone. If they were to come upon us 
now, we would fight them.” But it may be doubted 
whether any but a few have really lost their old fears. 

The Konde were never organized for war, and there 
was no military caste. Everything connected with 





A KOoNDE HuvgtT. 


Leisureliness is the key note of Konde life, and there is always time to sit down for the welcome 
chat about cattle, crops, chi!dren, or the white man, whose strange ways are of unfailing interest, 


LION HUNTING. 


The presence of a lion in a district causes a great scare, and the chief may call up all able- 

bodied men, arined with spears, clubs and bows, to the hunt. The lion—or leopard—is sometimes 

seized alive and clubbed or speared to death. The presence of a white man with a rifle gives 
increased courage to the hunters, 





Konde Warfare 177 


war was haphazard, or nearly so. Mostly a sudden 
rush to arms of untrained and unprepared men, with 
not even, in the less important cases, a declaration of 
war; though in the more important outbreaks a 
broken spear was sent as a token of hostility. This 
was the first intimation the Germans had in 1897 
that the lake-shore chiefs were determined to fight. 
Such training as the men had was gained in the open- 
air sports of the cattle-tending stage; running (a 
very important accomplishment for a Konde watrior), 
leaping, spear throwing and stabbing. The only idea 
of formation was the straight, or rather strageling, 
line ; the only conception of strategy was the sudden 
night or early morning attack. The man best pre- 
pared for battle was the man who had the greatest 
variety of medicines in or on him; nor can there be 
any doubt that these protective drugs and charms 
gave a sense of security which in turn generated a 
very real courage. Like so many other Bantu tribes, 
the Konde are a pastoral and agricultural community, 
so untrained in the arts of war that they did not even 
have stockades for protection, so common among 
most of their neighbours. The idea of a standing 
organization for defence or attack did not rise above 
their mental horizon, and when war came a wild rush 
to arms was their only resort. 


CHAPTER XIV 
The Supreme Being 


F the Supreme Being there is little that 

can be said with certainty beyond that He 

was believed in prior to the coming of the 

white man and the teachings of Christianity. 
The existence of this belief cannot be doubted. Indi- 
cations of it are found everywhere in the native mind 
inextricably intertwined with life and thought and 
language, with prayer and sacrifice, with birth and 
death, with famine and pestilence and sword. For 
the rest, there is much confusion. ‘That a developed 
theology does not exist, hardly needs to besaid. What 
one informant will give as common belief, another 
will say he never heard of ; it belongs, he will tell you, 
to another district, but it was not the belief of his 
fathers. 

Many parables and proverbs, of the pre-European 
origin of which there can be no doubt, give evidence 
of the belief in a Supreme Being. ‘‘ Who mocks at 
orphans,” says an old proverb, “let him beware: 
God is watching him.” ‘God will judge between 
us and the white man,” a common saying at funerals, 
is necessarily of recent origin; but there are scores 


of other sayings which are certainly ancient. Many 
178 


The Supreme Being 179 


of these are expressed in archaic language, which is 
not in use at all to-day, except in these and similar 
sayings. Thus we have, “ Chikulu ku nst,”” the Great 
One is everywhere; “ Gwende munono,’ go where 
you will (you will hear of God). “ Imbwa yikurwa pa 
lwigi,” literally means, the dog is fighting at the door, 
but the actual meaning is, God is within you. Ex- 
pressions like these are very numerous, and, even in 
their archaic form, are in common use every day. 

The names in use for the Deity give some indica- 
tion of how He is regarded. The name most com- 
monly used in Konde is Kyala, but although it is 
now almost exclusively used in public worship, in the 
translation of the Scriptures, and in hymns, it is, 
perhaps, the weakest of all the Divine names. For it 
may be applied to persons in whom the Deity dwells, 
or to men who, though they lived on earth, were yet 
Kyala. ‘The name is sometimes applied to white men, 
who are dangerous because they are believed to have 
closer relations with the source of all power than com- 
mon men have. Other names are Tenende, the Owner 
of all things ; Nkurumuke, the Undying One; Chaza, 
the Originator ; Kyaubiri, the Unseen ; Kalesi, He 
who is everywhere present. The name Ndorombwihe 
is the one used on solemn occasions, and comes from 
the verb kutoromboka, to create in a sense in which 
God only can. Mperi, again, is the Maker, applied 
to God only, though the verb from which it is derived 
may be applied to men also. 

Prayer 1s addressed directly to the ancestral spirits, 
who in many cases are conceived as having power of 


180 The Supreme Being 


themselves to grant a petition; but more frequently 
they are entreated to carry the petitions to God, who 
alone can give what is asked for. “‘ Why do you ask 
me for rain? ” says Chungu, when his impatient people 
come to him, “‘ God owns the rain, and only He can 
give it.’ “But,” reply the people, “ common men 
cannot pray. Pray you to your ancestors, and let 
them carry your prayer to God.” There is, however, 
also direct address in the formula, ‘Be gracious to us, 
O God, and hear the prayers of those whom we have 
named,” the reference being to the spirits, to whom 
the main body of the-petition is addressed. At birth, 
prayer is offered for the welfare of the child, ‘‘ May 
God be gracious to you, my son.” ‘The dead are with 
God, and the spirits who were in the underworld 
before the entrance there of the souls of men, see 
His face, ‘“‘ for these are they who see God.” Sickness 
also may be a divine infliction, though it may also be 
due to the wrath of an offended spirit. A heathen 
chief who came to see me during an illness, said, “ You 
will recover if it is God’s will,” words which might 
well be a mere echo of what he had heard from Chris- 
tian teachers; but the impression they made on me 
was that he was expressing a pious thought from the 
depths of his own being. 

When I was told that Chungu had once crossed the 
lake on dry land, and asked how that could be, the 
answer, quietly and seriously given, was that “ Chungu 
is the man who speaks with God”; why therefore 
should the statement be doubted? God gives to 
prophets their dream-visions, and to others their 


The Supreme Being 181 


inspired moments. He is the Maker of sorcerers as 
well as of common people. ‘“ Why do you kill me? ” 
demanded an agonized sorcerer from within the house 
where they were burning him to death. “ Did God 
not make me as well as you?” “ Yes,” was the grim 
reply, “but He also made the grass we burn in 
November.” 

The Supreme Being reveals Himself “in divers 
manners.’ What is specially great of its kind; a 
great ox, or even a he-goat ; a very big tree, or any 
other specially impressive object, is called Kyala, by 
which is probably meant that God takes up a temporary 
abode in them. In a great storm God is walking on 
the lake. A waterfall, when it is unusually noisy, is 
His voice. In 1921 God called from a waterfall in the 
Nserya district during the night, and the message, 
interpreted by the abakomwa malago (inspired per- 
sons), was that all must die because of the evil that 
was rampant in the district. The earthquake is His 
mighty footstep, and the lightning is Lesa, God 
coming down in anger, when all rational people sit 
silent or speak in whispers, lest “ the anger,” hearing 
them, should smite them down. He sometimes comes 
in the body of a lion or a snake, and in such a form 
““ He walks among men to see their doings.” 

He is a God of righteousness, though the Konde 
idea of righteousness does not always coincide with 
ours. Unrighteousness is an offence against God, even 
though they do not always know why, and He never 
comes except when evil is prevalent, and punishment 
is needed, a point of view from which it is easy to 


182 The Supreme Being 


understand that the chief desire of the people is to 
induce Him to go away again. ‘“‘ Go far hence, O 
God, to the Sango, for Thy House is very large,”’ 1s a 
prayer which is not seldom heard, when it is believed 
that He is near. An eclipse is a special visitation, and 
is met with wild drumming and shouting, confession 
of sins, and entreaties, for the consciousness of sin is 
by no means absent from their minds. Offerings are 
brought to the spirits to induce them to intercede, 
but no offerings are made to Ndorombwike Himself, 
for nothing can be offered that has any value for Him. 
“‘ God is calling in the waterfall,” “God has kindled 
a fire in the pool,” are cries of dread alarm to this day, 
only in a small degree comparable to the fear that is 
inspired when it is declared that a spirit, of however 
great a man, is angry. God is an ever present terror, 
and the idea of communion with Him for any purpose, 
is one that has not entered the Konde mind. He is 
Tenende, the Owner of the world, and it is for men 
to see that He is not offended. Of the many sins 
which bring the wrath of God and the spirits on the 
community, the most important are widespread 
sexual sin, and neglect of sacrifices. 

And yet God is Tata Twesa, the Father of us all, 
from whom help may be expected when men deserve 
it. ‘The remarkable incident of the floating of the 
Domira, referred to in Chapter I, bears its own 
evidence of native thinking about the Deity. “Then 
I said, Rejoice, for God has heard my prayers.” It 
does not seem open to reasonable doubt that Chungu 
was casting himself upon unseen powers, making, in 


The Supreme Being 183 


fact, what Christians call the venture of faith; and 
his men, believing that he was in touch with God, 
knew that he could give additional strength to their 
arms, and they pulled successfully. 

Nevertheless, it is important to guard against 
exaggerated ideas of the Supreme Being as He is 
conceived by the Konde. It is not to be supposed 
that the African idea of Omnipotence has much in 
common with the Christian and Philosophic ideas on 
the subject. God is a magnified human being, a being 
anthropomorphically conceived. Omnipotence is an 
idea limited by the native capacity to conceive of 
powers beyond power to do without limit what he 
himself can do within limits. The vastness of time 
and space, and the illimitable forces acting throughout 
the universe, are unrepresented in the native mind, 
and therefore the conception of a Supreme Being is 
severely limited. But the point is, that such as He 
is, He is supreme over men and spirits, and over the 
forces of Nature as these are understood; and that 
is sufficient in the minds of the Konde, as it is sufficient 
in the minds of more highly developed peoples, to 
place God in a category by Himself, in a position 
which He shares with no other being. 

Do the Konde recognize minor deities? ‘The 
question is not easy to answer. An old man with 
whom I was conversing on the subject recently, looked 
at me with surprise when I brought the conversation 
round to “other gods.” ‘‘’There is only one Kyala 
(God),” he said with great emphasis, and other old 
men gave the same decided reply ; nor do the younger 


184 The Supreme Being 


men admit that their fathers ever acknowledged more 
than one God. And yet, as I have already indicated, 
the name Kyala is by no means restricted to the 
Supreme Being; and there are legends of human 
gods which go far back into the past. ‘The Henga, 
a neighbouring tribe, freely acknowledge the worship, 
in the past, of a number of minor deities, and belief 
in them is common among the Bantu peoples generally. 
This is, perhaps, the point at which the confusion in 
the Konde mind reveals itself most decidedly, for it 
is the border line between the spirits of great chiefs 
still active in the underworld, minor deities, and the 
Supreme Being Himself. 

In the land of Marongo, from which the Konde 
originally came, so say the fathers (who in the same 
breath will deny the existence of more than one God), 
there were three gods, Lyambilo, Mbasi, and Ngeketo. 
Of Lyambilo all that need be said is that he is still the 
god of the Kinga. Ngeketo was the youngest of the 
three, and one day he went with his boy friends to 
herd the cattle on the plain. While they were there 
Ngeketo took maize and planted it, and lo! it grew, 
anid the same day they ate it roasted in the fire. When 
the elders of the people and the other two gods heard 
of it, they were jealous and slew Ngeketo. He lay 
dead for three days, and on the third day he arose, 
but was killed again in exceeding great anger. Again 
he arose, and was seen by some, but disappeared, and 
it was said that he went to the coast, where he became 
the God of the white man. ‘The older men say that 
this story has not been modified by Christian influence 


The Supreme Being 185 


and it may be so, but there is a variant, which is free 
from suspicion, in which the God came back to life 
in the form of a serpent, was cut to pieces by his 
fellow-gods and the elders, who, when he again came 
back, served him as before, upon which he went to 
the white man, who to this day prays to him. At 
Karonga the old people used to say, “‘ We have smitten 
the Son of God in the neck,” but I have not been 
able to trace the origin or connection of the saying, 
except that it is not Christian, and may be connected 
with traditions of Ngeketo. 

The story of Mbasi is very different. He is the 
evil one, to whom deceit and wickedness are a pleasure. 
Europeans are still living who have seen the great 
stores of ivory and cloth which were offered to him 
by terror-inspired people, and laid up in a cave at 
Matema on the lake shore. The cave has now been 
robbed of its contents, as Mbasi himself has been of 
whatever of dread his name inspired in the past. It 
is not very long ago that the last prophet of Mbasi 
died. He lived near Masoko, and within living memory 
he climbed a small eminence there, and proclaimed 
that Mbasi demanded cattle to be sent to him without 
delay, the prophet himself being the guardian ap- 
pointed by the God. And the cattle were sent in 
goodly numbers ! 

Long ago, says a legend, when Mbasi walked 
the earth, he had men who were always with him. 
Mwasomola went with him to his friend Mwakanya- 
mata. Mbasi told them many things, of witchcraft, 
of hunger, of diseases that were to come, of the 


186 The Supreme Being 


approach of the Angoni warriors, and where to flee 
for safety when they arrived. He asked for bhang 
and a pipe, and these were laid on the ground, and 
soon smoke was seen issuing from the earth. For 
Mbasi was not seen ; they only heard his voice. ‘Then 
he became communicative. “The Angoni are coming 
now,” he told them, ‘‘ go at once to Masoko with your 
wives and children and cattle.” ‘The unfortunate 
Mwakanyamata did as he was advised, only to be 
robbed of all his cattle by another friend of Mbas1, to 
whom the deceitful God sent word to have no mercy 
on the cattle of a fool like Mwakanyamata, who 
believed what he was told! And to this day Mwaka- 
nyamata is laughed at as the man who allowed himself 
to be deceived by the wiles of Mbasz. 

According to another version, Mbasit was a rival 
claimant to Divine honours with Ndorombwike Him- 
self. Originally he was a serpent, killed in the dim 
past by the chief Mwakibinga. Mbasi: returned to 
earth as a spirit, seeking to persuade men to worship 
him, offering them wealth in cattle if they agreed. 
But men refused, “for the dead do not return.” 
One chief, Mwatonoka, accepted the false God, but 
was defeated in battle by Mwakarobo, a final proof 
that Mbasi was a deceiver. 

Stories of Mbasi and his activities are numerous. 
He used to do some of his own work; that is to say, 
instead of sending one of his prophets to demand 
what he wanted, he shouted from the great i/isyeto 
(grave of a chief; place of prayer) at Lubaga in 
Nserya, and made his own demands. M§ilk, beer, 


The Supreme Being 187 


bananas, were placed at the door of Mwakindingo 
his prophet, and if in the morning the quantity was 
found to be less, it was clear to all that Mobasi had 
come to receive the offerings. 

But the trick worked too often. As the fear of 
Mbasi diminished, men began to take advantage of 
their still credulous neighbours, and te demand in 
the name of the fading divinity cattle, beer, food 
supplies, to be sent to the places indicated by the 
impersonator of the God. This became so common 
that the Germans, who then ruled the country, 
interfered and put it down. 

Very long ago there lived near Karonga a man 
called Firagul, who after his death became a godlet, 
and lived on the mountain which now goes by his 
name. ‘There was also a great man called Kambwe, 
who entered the ranks of the gods or godlets at his 
death, and lived in the pool a few miles from Karonga, 
to which in like manner he has given his name. To 
both of these divinities the people prayed in long- 
past times; and both, though able to see to the 
general welfare of the people, were not strong enough 
to punish them when evil was prevalent. When 
punishment was necessary, they called in the help of 
Mwanjebe, a minor deity of the neighbouring Henga 
people. Firaguli went south on a favouring breeze 
to invite his more powerful neighbour to come to his 
help ; and Mwanjebe, who lived in a pool at the foot 
of a waterfall near the Overtoun Institution, came 
up on a floating island. ‘Then smallpox broke out 
among the people, and if a visit to Kambwe showed 


188 The Supreme Being 


that the pool was bubbling, it was evident that 
Mwanjebe was there, and must be got rid of as soon 
as possible. Prayers and promises of repentance 
were offered, and if that did not satisfy the god, 
more drastic measures were taken. A great stone was 
heated and tumbled into the pool, around which 
gathered a great multitude of people, stabbing fiercely 
at the water with spears and reeds, to drive off the 
unwelcome deity. ‘The cessation of the bubbling 
showed that he had gone, and the fact was still further 
proved when the smallpox ceased. All three godlets 
are now mere memories, and, except as memories, 
they have completely vanished, leaving the field clear 
for the ancestral spirits and the Supreme Being. 
There was in the worship, if indeed a determined 
effort to drive off the deity could be called worship, 
“no stimulus to the realization of the riches which 
are given to man in his own nature.” ‘The gods 
presented no problems, for all problems were solved 
long ago by the fathers ; and hence man’s relation to 
them contained nothing upon which the faculties 
might work and be developed. ‘The religion was 
stagnant, and the people were stagnant with it. 
‘There was no art; not even rude representations 
of the gods; no poetry arising out of a feeling of 
devotion, for devotion there was none. In the case 
of the godlets I have mentioned, even the qualities 
which caused them to take rank as gods after death 
have been forgotten. It may be that the stories of 
“the brave days of old,” to be related in a later 
chapter, afford us a hint of how the process of deifica- 


The Supreme Being 189 


tion, now probably at an end for ever, went on in 
the past. But the Konde, in common with all Bantu 
peoples, made the great transition from a vague ill- 
conceived “ power behind an object or an act, to the 
free being conceived with human attributes and 
feelings,’ who can interfere in the affairs of the 
community, even if it be also true that such gods 
roused themselves into activity only when evil 
demanded punishment, remaining quiescent except 
under such stimulus. 


CHAPTER XV 
The Ancestral Spirits 


HE importance of the spirits in the every- 
day life of the Konde can hardly be over- 
estimated. From the day that the month- 
old infant is presented by the head of the 

family to the spirits of its ancestors—though this 
ceremony is dying out at Karonga—until the day of 
death, when the spirit is directed to go in peace and 
confidence to meet his forefathers, living and dead 
are mingled in one stream of life, form one community, 
and are dependent upon each other for many of the 
best things “above” on earth here, and “ below” 
where the spirits are. Yet it is by no means easy to 
define the relation of the living man to the spirits of 
his fathers who are ever about him. It is, perhaps 
with more facility than the facts warrant, usually 
defined as an attitude of worship; but there are at 
least indications that the attitude is incompletely 
expressed by the idea of worship. 

Sacrifices, or offerings, are made to the spirits ; and 
this, it need not be doubted, is an act of worship. 
The word used is ukwikemesya, which is used by 
British and German missionaries to denote an act of 
worship offered to God. On the other hand, the 

190 


The Ancestral Spirits IQI 


food, beer, and other things placed at the graves, are 
intended to maintain in some way the life of the 
spirits, to keep them in countenance in their own 
world. For as men are dependent on the goodwill 
of the spirits for the best things of life, so do the 
spirits depend upon their descendants on earth for 
much of what they require in the other world. 

The dead are conceived as obtaining a great access 
of power on passing into the spirit world, power for 
good or evil, and to placate them is one of the chief 
preoccupations of Konde life, But while it would 
not be true to say that compulsion can be brought 
to bear upon the spirits, that once the appropriate 
ceremonies are performed, the spirit must fulfil the 
prayer of the petitioners, yet so complete is the faith 
of the common man in the power of these ceremonies, 
that it may be suggested that prayer and answer are 
inseparably bound up together ; if compulsion is too 
strong a word, obligation, if milder, is perhaps 
sufficient. 

The spirits are called basyuka. The verb kusyuka 
means to rise from the dead, to resume ordinary 
bodily activities; but the noun formed from this 
verb, wnsyuka (of which the plural is basyuka), means 
the inner man, the life of which is independent of 
the body. Now when the unsyuka leaves the body, 
it does not die, it goes to ubusyuka, the land of spirits, 
where in all respects except that of having a body, it 
retains its humanity. he spirits are not, however, 
called abandu men; though the related term imindu, 
which, applied to living men, is an insult, is often 


192 The Ancestral Spirits 


given to them. ‘There is no conception more firmly 
fixed in the Konde mind than that ‘ the dead do not 
return”; they do not resume earthly life in bodily’ 
form; though they do return in spirit form, and 
sometimes exert themselves very energetically. ‘The 
dead are with God: this is a conviction so universal 
that it cannot be the result of Christian teaching. 
And God is not above, as in our cosmology, but 


7418 a frequent 


below. ‘“‘Kumwanya kuno malabasya,’ 
expression on the lips of some people. Kwirabasya 
means to be idle when one might be working; and 
the meaning of the phrase is that man’s permanent 
home is not “‘ above” on earth, but ‘ below,” very 


much as in the statement of St. Paul, ‘‘ our citizen- 


99 


ship is in heaven.” 

At death, or rather at burial, the head of the 
family, calling for silence from the wailing women, 
addresses the spirits by name, praying them to receive 
their friend. ‘Then addressing the dead man directly, 
he says : 


‘“‘ And you, friend, go to the land of spirits. Go 
in peace. Go to meet all whom we have named. 
They will recognize you. Salute them all. Tell 
them that we are paying taxes, that those men are 
an affliction to us. It was not we who killed you. 
Nay, we weep for your death.” 


The words, ‘‘ these men are affliction to us,” refer 
to the Europeans, and are still in use, though of recent 
years they have been gradually dropping out of the 
valedictory address at the grave. Another expression 


The Ancestral Spirits 193 


still sometimes used, is “* God will judge between us 
and the white man,” a clear indication that the white 
man is not received everywhere as an unmixed 
blessing. 

The entrance to the spirit world is the grave ; and 
all that is done there is intended to give the dead man 
a favourable entrance upon his new state; well 
dressed, well supplied with all the necessaries of life ; 
for he goes to God. The conditions of life below are 
the same as those above. The chief is a chief still, 
and the slave a slave. The rich man continues to be 
rich, and the poor goes on in his poverty. The wife 
goes to her husband, children to their parents. There 
is no retribution, no righting of wrongs. The judg- 
ment of God against the white man will be manifested 
here on earth, not in the future state. The un- 
married man remains unmarried, and his body is 
smeared with charcoal, so that he may not, on arrival, 
be mistaken for a married man. Cattle are there, but 
they need no tending ; bananas, but they require no 
cultivation. There is bush for the hunter, and 
streams for the fisher. But everything is small: 
cattle, houses, crops, even the spirits themselves, are 
sekere, thin, unsubstantial. 

Prior to the arrival of the first human spirits, the 
place was inhabited by the owners of the land; and 
“these are they who see God, for God is a Spirit.” 
Therefore human beings going there are strangers, 
but are well received, and given all necessaries, 
including land. 

Although the dwelling of the spirits is below, they 


N 


194 The Ancestral Spirits 


are by no means confined to that region, but come up 
frequently, especially at night, when they sit on the 
eraves and chat, or go to the houses of their descend- 
ants seeking food or beer, and to assure themselves 
that there is still a “fire” there, and fire means 
descendants. In the house they make a noise, bu, hu, 
hu, heard by the people within, and morning reveals 
soiled food and beer grown thick, evidence that 
cannot be gainsaid of a spirit-visitor. Spirits are 
sometimes visible, but if addressed by name they will 
disappear. ‘They cannot be seen in bright moonlight, 
and fire renders them invisible: a fireless house at 
night is still a terror to little children. A visit from 
a spirit is most unwelcome, especially to women and 
children, though the men claim that they are not 
afraid. Specially terrifying is a recently dead person 
who has been buried near the house. “‘Pasisya panja” 
(there is terror outside) they say on a dark night, for 
the spirit of the dead man may be sitting on the 
mound which marks his grave. No one willingly 
passes the grave of a dead chief at night, for one may 
hear his name called ; then woe to the man who looks 
behind, for he will die; or if he hears his name, but 
has the will not to look, some lesser evil will overtake 
him. 

Wood noises in a wind, the moaning of the trees, is 
the voice of a spirit in the tree. If a branch snaps, 
and the passer-by looks round, evil will come ; and if 
his name is called it is a sign that “* his number is up,” 
he has not long to live. But it may happen that the 
snapping of the branch is quite harmless, being 


The Ancestral Spirits 195 


merely intended to make him look round, so that the 
spirit may get a good view of him, and see if he is his 
* child.” 

The spirits return to earth for many reasons, but 
chiefly for two. The first is to assure themselves that 
they still have descendants on earth ; for if the family 
dies out it is a dreadful calamity for the ghosts: they 
become frogs. ‘The second reason is to make sure 
that they are not forgotten by the living, for the spirit 
to whom no attention is paid by the living becomes of 
no account in the underworld. Hence the illness or 
other misfortune which overtakes the living; stern 
reminder of duty to the dead, who will not permit 
neglect. 

By night the spirits, when they are visible at all, 
take human form ; but by day they come in the form 
of birds, serpents, lions; and they come as small red 
or black ants to eat the flesh offered in sacrifice at the 
grave of a chief. When the spirit takes the form of a 
serpent, he is testing the loyalty of his descendants : if 
they try to kill him, it is a bad sign; they ought to 
know who it is, for such ‘‘ occupied ” snakes never 
bite anyone. Only chiefs enter into lions, going 
about to see how the people are behaving. God 
Himself also comes in this form, and for the same 
reason; and the lion, like the serpent, is harmless. 
The idea, common in some parts of Bantu Africa, 
that a child who resembles his dead grandfather 1s 
that grandfather come back to life, 1s scoffed at by 
the Konde. ‘The child is like his grandfather, and 
that is all. 


196 The Ancestral Spirits 


Of the persons officially connected with the spirits, 
the most important is the chief. It has already been 
said that ‘‘ Chungu is the man who speaks with God ” ; 
he is also the man who speaks with authority to the 
spirits. He, and all other chiefs, approach the spirits 
for the general good, but as heads of families they 
have the right to offer private prayers as well. Each 
head of a family may also pray for his own people ; 
but no man may pray so long as his father or elder 
brother is alive. Next, every chief has an official who 
may be called a priest; he is the ununyago, the man 
whose duty it is to go daily at the order of the chief 
to present an offering at the grave where the last 
chief is buried. He does not pray; he simply lays the 
offering, usually a few maize cobs, on the grave and 
departs. When the chief goes in person to pray, as 
he sometimes does, without any public ceremony, 
this man goes with him, hears the prayers, and knows 
the ritual ; and it is he who will teach the new chief 
his duties when the time comes for him to perform 
them. When, however, the chief dies, the unnyago 
is in great danger, for the spirits take possession of his 
person, a danger which can only be averted by a 
powerful medicine supplied by the doctor, and taken as 
soon as the chief has died. If this is not done, he 
becomes mad, lives in the bush, gibbering and naming 
all the dead chiefs of the past, including names known 
to no living person, but supposed to be those of long- 
dead chiefs, uttered by themselves through him. 

With regard to places of worship: the “ high 


place” is always at the grave of the dead chief; and 


The Ancestral Spirits 197 


it is there that prayer for the community at large is 
offered by the living chief. All over the land there 
are more or less important graves, where local chiefs 
pray with their people; but the most important 1s 
naturally the one at Mphande, near Karonga, where 
Chungu goes to pray. At the house of every head of 
a family there is the zkzyinja, the sacred banana grove, 
where the family ceremonies are performed. ‘This 
grove is never cut down, and the wife must not eat 
the fruit of it, for the spirit of her father-in-law 1s 
there if he is dead; if not, of ancestral fathers-in-law. 
The decay of the spirit hut, a small erection covering 
the grave of a chief, is attended with great danger to 
all the people, for the dead chief will some day visit 
his resentment upon his unworthy successor, whose 
duty it is to keep the hut in order; and when the 
chief suffers, his land suffers with him. A sheep or 
goat is tied up at the place, and if it is found there in 
the morning, all is well, it is killed, and the hut is re- 
built. But if it has been killed by some prowling 
beast of prey, the dead chief is very angry, and the 
diviner must say what else must be done to appease 
him, before another animal is found for the sacrifice, 
and the hut rebuilt. 

Here and there are to be found traces of non- 
human spirits. They are not called basyuka, but 
mapiri, a word which in the neighbouring Henga 
dialect means hills, but the Konde use it in invoca- 
tion when crossing water. heir dwelling is in the 
water ; and they are pre-human, spirits that were in 
the world when the whole earth was covered with 


198 The Ancestral Spirits 


water. When, later, men came, more favoured of 
God, the waters retired to the lakes and pools, and 
there these spirits exist to this day, at enmity with 
men, whom they seek to destroy. On the lake, during 
a storm, they are still to be heard, demanding a victim 
to be thrown to them whom they may “ eat.” In the 
past, if a canoe was overtaken by a storm, one of the 
rowers was thrown into the water, whereupon the 
storm ceased, and the others arrived in safety. 

At many places all over the district there are pools 
in which these spirits dwell. ‘The most interesting is 
at Kisyombe, and about it many stories are told, and 
believed, which throw an interesting light on the 
Konde mind. When the chief of three generations 
ago was a very old man, it was prophesied that at his 
death the lake would recede, the fish would die, bush 
would grow where water was, and a great disease 
would carry off many of the people. And it all 
happened. But the lake, as it receded, left a pool in 
which some spirits were imprisoned. It is now partly 
silted up with sand, and treacherous to walk upon. 
If a man finds himself sinking as he walks over it, he 
calls out that he belongs to Kisyombe, whereupon he 
is pushed up from below by the water-spirits, who 
own Kisyombe’s power. A boy who sank right 
through, but was returned, was directed by the spirits 
to give a report of all that he saw, and particularly he 
must insist that these spirits are abandu (human 
beings). If no sacrifice is offered the spirits take their 
due, by snatching at passing children ; but it is long 
since the last child was taken. The pool at Rungwe is 


The Ancestral Spirits 199 


distinguished for the drastic action of the people, 
who, exasperated by the frequent disappearance of 
children, tumbled an immense heated stone into the 
pool, and so drove out the spirits, who to this day 
dwell in a pool in the Sango country, “ where the 
white men go to see them.” 

Yet another class are the mountain or hill spirits. 
Offerings are made to them by people climbing steep 
hill-sides. A stone is picked up, breathed upon, and 
laid upon a large flat stone, or in the fork of a tree, 
with the prayer, “ May my feet be light.” ‘These 
stones are to be seen to-day in small heaps on many a 
steep ascent. Sometimes more valuable offerings were 
made, though these have now ceased. A fowl, a sheep, 
or a goat, was brought, and left alive to meet whatever 
fate might be in store for it. These spirits, like those 
of the water, are pre-human, and hostile to mankind, 
upon whom they bring many diseases. Belief in them 
is dying out, and the younger people know little or 
nothing about them. 


CHAPTER XVI 
The Worship of the Spirits 


HE Konde are either a deeply religious, or 

a deplorably spirit-ridden people; and, 

having regard to some of the prayers given 

in this chapter and throughout the book, I 
am inclined to think that religious is the more correct 
term. It is true that the prayers are in all cases for 
material goods, such as health and good fortune, for 
rain and crops, for protection against pestilence ; but 
if religion means a sense of dependence upon unseen 
powers, then it cannot be denied that the Konde are 
religious. 

On all great occasions, prayer and offerings are made; 
but also when a spirit is believed to be angry: if there 
is quarrelling in the family ; if a man beats his wife ; 
if a girl has arrived at puberty, or a marriage has been 
arranged, without their being consulted ; if a woman 
has been unfaithful to her husband ; if a man neglect 
his parents; if ceremonies are neglected; or the 
spirits themselves forgotten. ‘Their wrath is shown 
very specially by a disease of the lips breaking out on 
the guilty person, and by fever; but also in many 
other ways ; by the failure of the beer to ferment, by 


sickness, by a storm in which some one is drowned, by 
200 


The Worship of the Spirits 201 


failure of crops, of increase of livestock, of children, 
by too little or too much rain, or by ill-success in 
hunting or fishing; and, very emphatically, by a 
sudden death. 

The prayer and ceremony at the presentation of a 
new-born child have already been given. More 
pathetic is the prayer offered when a child is ill. 
Standing at the sacred banana grove, the family 
representative prays : 

«¢ . . and now this little one whom I hold in 
my hands, be gracious to him. He [she] has come 
into a world of sickness, of cold, of all the troubles 
that you yourselves were familiar with. Let him 
lie in peace. Let none in the spirit-land be angry 
with him. ‘To-morrow he will be full-grown, and 
he will bring you beer, flesh, flour. Pray to God 
for him. O God, who art Lord of all, let thy 
breath be cool upon him (liti, Let thy spittle be 


cool upon him).” 


Then, spitting on the child’s breast and back, he 
Says : 
“‘And thou child, may there be life in thee. God 
be gracious unto thee. Live in peace and be not 
wearied.” 


Not all diseases are due to the anger of the spirits ; 
a natural illness is one that yields to treatment. It is 
the act of God, and when the right medicine has been 
used, cure will follow, for God does not need to be 
entreated as the spirits do. Yet the spirits carry their 
petitions to God, as if He did need to be entreated, 


202 The Worship of the Spirits 


but the Konde see no contradiction there. If a 
diviner has to be consulted, the process is long, and 
the result not certain, at least at first. The omission 
of a name from the list of ancestors may cause delay, 
for the omitted one will refuse to go to God with the 
petition, and unanimity is of the very essence of prayer. 
Or, again, the wrong person may offer the prayer and 
offerings which follow upon discovery, by the diviner, 
of the offended spirit; this is so important that I 
have known a man go a hundred and forty miles 
to his elder brother, to have his prayers correctly 
offered. 

The uwmputi (person who prays; the name is now 
applied to all clergymen) goes to the graveside, or he 
stands at the banana grove set apart for the purpose, 
or on the verandah of his house, and prays : 


“‘ My fathers, I have come to you because I have 
found that you have caused the illness of my friend. 
You are angry with him because he has given you 
no beer. Now the malesi (cereal from which beer 
is made) is here; behold it, all of you, with your 
eyes, and when it is made I will bring it to you and 
you shall be satisfied. ‘Then let the sickness leave 
the body of our friend.” 


Then taking water into his mouth, he squirts it out 
pu (puta, pray). 

When the beer has been made, he goes again 
to pray : 


2 


“You, and you, and you [naming them], come 
to the feast. You who died by a crocodile, who 


The Worship of the Spirits 203 


were killed by a tree, who were killed in war, by 
lightning, by lion or leopard, I call you all to come ; 
and whosoever has been forgotten, let him come. 
I pray to you all, let my dog be well, let him lie 
down in peace. He is the saliva of God. O God, 


be merciful, and turn back the disease.” 


The beer that he brought and laid on the ground 
before him, is now poured into the palms of little 
children, who drink it in that way. Ii a flesh offering 
is also made, it is laid down in small pieces, and each 
ancestor is named as his portion is laid down. When 
ants come out to feast on it, it is known that the 
spirits have accepted the offering, and all present run 
away lest the spirits should work evil upon them. 

Little children are affectionately referred to as 
dogs, especially when they commit a fault, which the 
father apologizes for. “‘ How can you be angry with 
the little one? He has no more sense of what is fitting 
than a dog.” But to call a person a dog in any other 
connection is a great insult, and must be atoned for. 
Spitting on a person is another insult, but when done 
ceremonially, it is believed to have great virtue, and is 
no doubt connected with the idea of the “ Spittle of 
God ” referred to above. 

If the sick person does not recover, the fault is not 
in the system. Some mistake has been made, the 
diviner is unskilful, his wife is ‘‘ unclean,” or some 
other cause prevents the expected result from follow- 
ing ; for, when the proper ceremonies have been per- 
formed, the patient recovers. But a final cause of 
failure is always kept in hand ; it is the will of God 


204. The Worship of the Spirits 


that the sick man should die, and there is nothing 
more that can be done. Numerous instances have 
been cited to me of recovery of sick persons when 
all had been correctly performed ; and scepticism on 
the subject was received with almost incredulous 
amazement. And there is no reason to doubt that in 
many cases recovery did follow; for the conviction 
in the mind of the patient that the wrath of the 
offended spirit had been averted, would, according 
to modern ideas of psychology, have a healing effect 
also upon his body. 

Smallpox is the disease most dreaded by the people, 
and its approach was accompanied with most elaborate 
ceremonies. ‘The subject is dealt with again under 
“Witchcraft”? and “ Medicine.’ It might come 
either through the action of the spirits or through 
witchcraft. In either case its approach is foreseen by 
the abakunguluka (prophets) in dreams, and the chief 
and his subordinates go to the grave of the ancestors, 
and there, by night, a black ram is killed. The lungs 
and liver are roasted, and laid in little heaps on the 
grave, each ancestor being named as his portion is 
laid down, and prayer is offered : 


“Ye fathers, look upon us in mercy. Drive 
away from us this plague, lest our children die, 
and none be left in the land. Send it to the 
Basango or the Basafwa, but save us. Pray to God 
for us. Hear, O God, the words of those we have 
named, And go to the west, O God, or to the 
Basango.”’ 


The Worship of the Spirits 205 


The flesh is now eaten roasted, and the stomach of 
the animal, filled with medicines not known to me, is 
given to an old man, and the skin placed on his back ; 
with these he goes, by night, through the whole dis- 
trict covered by the prayer. If the journey is not 
finished in one night, he lies in a village until it 1s 
dark again, care being taken that he is seen by none, 
and completes his circuit. On his return, the chief 
calls all the people together, and declares that if the 
disease is the work of witchcraft, the evil ones will 
certainly be discovered and punished; but if it is 
the work of the spirits, “‘ we have prayed to them to 
send it far hence to the Basango.”’ Family ceremonies, 
of a similar nature, follow, each head of a family 
offering a little beer to his ancestors. At Karonga this 
latter ceremony has almost entirely been abandoned. 
There, however, the prophet to whom the coming of 
smallpox has been revealed goes about the villages, 
crying, “‘ilibofu, ilibofu, ilibofu’’ (smell, of dead 
bodies), a dreadful cry, which brings the people in a 
mass to the chief to demand the performance of the 
ceremonies. Similar prayers are offered when mumps, 
dysentery, or widespread eye disease visits the com- 
munity. 

When a man is about to set out on a journey, his 
father gives him his blessing, and prays to the spirits 
for him, adding: 

‘* May lion and leopard and hyena, crocodile and 
snake and falling tree, be far from you, and may you 
return in peace.” 


206 The Worship of the Spirits 


A person involved in a lawsuit was similarly prayed 
for: 
‘* Be merciful, and let his case be good. May he 
escape and return to us; for those men are gods ; 
whom they imprison they imprison, and whom they 


kill they kill.” 


The men referred to are the European Administrative 
Officers, before whom cases are heard., If the case is 
tried by a native chief, the clause is omitted. A man 
who has been away at work, in the employment of a 
white man, gives, on his return in safety, a piece of 
cloth to the family representative, who, after it has 
been laid up in the house for a time, asks the per- 
mission of the spirits to wear it, for it is theirs; and, 
taking their permission for granted, leaves a tiny rag 
to represent it. Less careful persons wear it at once, 
the rag being enough to keep the spirits in good temper. 
‘The numerous other occasions on which worship is 
offered are described in the appropriate chapters. 

Greatest of all Konde ceremonies is the prayer for 
rain. And around this ceremony much erroneous 
information has collected; for the so-called “ rain- 
maker ”? does not make the rain ; his duties are quite 
different. The rain is the gift of God; it is His to 
give or withhold as He sees fit. All that living men 
can do is to pray to the spirits, who, in turn, present 
the petition to God ; and God, if there is no obstacle 
among men themselves, will grant the petition. 

Of sacred objects connected with rain ceremonies, 
the most important is the mulima (an old word mean- 
ing the world), which is never seen by anyone except 


The Worship of the Spirits 207 


its guardian, and very rarely even by him. It was 
originally in the possession of Chungu, but some 
generations ago was passed secretly by the reigning 
Chungu to a son who was hated by the people, and 
not in the least likely to succeed to royal dignity. It 
is at present guarded by a man called “ ‘Tom,” though, 
fortunately perhaps, the honorific name of Mwaka- 
banga is used in direct address. As no one sees it, 
descriptions must be received with caution, and there 
are many natives who disbelieve in its existence, 
regarding the whole story as the invention of men 
who wished to gain honour for themselves. It is 
commonly described as about the size of a man’s fist, 
with maso (eyes) all over it, of the size and colour of 
a red bean. When the eyes open, rain is coming, 
when they close it is being withheld. But, as the 
mulima is kept buried in the ground, it is not quite 
clear how it is known whether the eyes are closed or 
open. So long as the stone, if it is a stone, 1s kept in 
the ground rain will fall normally, but if the guardian 
has a quarrel with another chief, he will dig it up, a 
signal to the spirits that something is wrong, which 
must be dealt with before they go to God to ask for 
the rain. 

Prayer for rain is offered, either when it becomes 
clear that ‘‘ God’s rain,”’ that is to say, rain that comes 
without prayer, is not to fall; or when the official 
dreamers declare that they do not see the rain where 
they always see it. Numerous variations in the actual 
words and ceremonies are found, almost every chief 
having some special form of his own; but what 1s 


208) thine Worship of the Spirits 


here given is obtained from descriptions by persons 
who were actually present at prayer offered by Chungu. 
‘The decision to pray does not originate with the chief 
himself; it comes from the people, who approach 
Chungu through the subordinate chiefs, and Chungu, 
after reminding them that only God can give rain, 
consents to pray. 

In the past a human sacrifice was offered, and the 
flesh of the victim, burned and ground to powder, 
was distributed over the district as a “ medicine ”’ 
guaranteed to ensure a good crop. This has long 
ceased at Karonga; the last known occurrence of it 
farther north was in 1907, when a boy of about ten 
was sacrificed ; and in 1917 a boy mysteriously dis- 
appeared, not without suspicion that he was offered 
in sacrifice. I have been told that human sacrifice is 
offered in the Kinga Mountains even now; but, 
except for repeated statements, I have no evidence. 
The victim, always a boy, is made to drink beer until 
he dies, when his body is burned and ground to powder 
for distribution. ‘The child is selected in secret con- 
clave by the chiefs, and no one knows that the tragedy 
has taken place until public announcement has been 
made, except the parents of the boy, whose dis- 
appearance must have been known to them. Weeping 
for the victim is prohibited. 

For the ordinary sacrifice offered to-day, a black or 
white ox or cow, preferably the latter, has to be found, 
and brought to Chungu. The owner must be paid, 
and there is a case known where refusal to do so led 
to the failure of the whole ceremony. When the 


*‘pouopurge sulog A[jenpeis 
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24} pue ‘oulljpeq je poysinsul}xe oie yoryM sory Aq pozeoy ‘syid ut dosjs ojdood oy} yey} ‘read oy} Jo red Sulanp 4v9I9 Os sI pfoo sy] 


(GONVY ANOLSONIAIT) SNIVINNOJT VONIS AHL NJ 








The Worship of the Spirits 209 


animal is found Chungu and his councillors go to the 
river to wash, and must not return to their wives 
until the whole ceremony is over. Arrived at the 
ilisyeto (burial place), the chief and those who are 
with him salute the dead by lying prone on their 
backs, then turning to the right, and finally assuming 
a sitting position, a soft hand-clapping accompanying 
these movements. Chungu then, sitting on the 
ground, and with his eyes open, addresses his ancestors : 


‘* Hear me, ye who were before us [naming them]. 
I have brought this ox for the whole people. We 
cry to you. Why are you angry with us? Why do 
you not go to God to pray for us? Our children 
are dying. Pray for us. ‘Thou who art not seen 
with the eyes of men, hear the petitions of those 
whom we name unto thee.” 


The animal is then killed by a blow on the back of 
the neck with an axe, and the flesh laid in little heaps 
upon the grave, each ancestor being named as his 
portion is laid down. The chief and his followers also 
feast until the ants come out and attack the portions 
laid down for the spirits, when all flee, for the spirits 
have come to accept the sacrifice, and it is well not 
to be too near them. For three days those who took 
part in the ceremony remain in their houses, for they 
have been in contact with unseen powers, and are 
dangerous until the effect has passed off. If the 
animal brought for sacrifice breaks its halter and gets 
away during the prayers, it is a token that something 
is wrong, and all proceedings are stayed until the 


wrong is discovered and righted. 
O 


210 ‘The Worship of the Spirits 


Now begin the duties of the person who is called 
the rainmaker. In the Misuku Hills there is a rain 
forest, the trees of which drop moisture. Word is 
sent to the local chief that the spirits have accepted 
the prayers of Chungu; and a quantity of rain-tree 
twigs is sent and delivered to the rainmaker. ‘This 
official, known as the umsusi, goes to the lake by night 
to fetch water, which is placed in a pot along with 
the twigs, and some small smooth black or white stones, 
the pot being now covered with banana leaves, and 
placed near a small bush “‘ where God stores the rain.” 
The rainmaker now goes into his house, where he prays, 
lying on his face; a position which he retains until 
rain has actually fallen. Chungu also continues in 
prayer. 

The rainmaker is a quite inferior official. In the 
past he might be a slave, or any other unimportant 
person appointed for the duty. His function seems to 
be that of a “ conductor,” through whose person, or 
acts, or abstinence from action, the continuance of 
the rain granted at the prayer of the chief is assured. 
He must not cut his hair during the rainy season, for 
the heavens would dry up if he did. He must not 
wash in water, for that would bring on a flood; in 
June he may begin cautiously to wash himself, and 
later he may indulge in the luxury of a full bath, and 
at the same time he may cut, but not shave, his hair. 
He must not be angry or scold during the rains, lest 
he bring on a lightning storm with fatal effects to 
some one. Further, during all those months he may 
not roast maize or ground-nuts, the leaping of which 


The Worship of the Spirits 211 


while being roasted is like the play of lightning, and 
would bring on a fatal stroke from the sky. 

In 1912 “‘ God’s rain” fell as usual in December ; 
but in January came drought which continued into 
February. Urgent messages were sent to Chungu, 
who replied that he was helpless, as the mulima was 
lost. After diligent inquiry, it was found to be in 
possession of Mwandosya, who refused to act, because 
in the distribution of the cattle of a deceased relative 
another chief, Kasikula, had taken more than his share. 
Kasikula was ordered by Chungu to restore the balance, 
but he refused, and only agreed when the men present 
took up clubs to thrash him into obedience. Prayer 
was then offered in the usual way, and Mwandosya 
announced that God had commanded him to forgive 
the offender. ‘‘ Rain,” he said, ‘‘ will come at once. 
You Karonga, will be overtaken by it before you can 
reach home.” And so it fell out. Rain came in 
torrents, preceded by a great storm which overthrew 
a number of trees in a neighbouring estate, and greatly 
injured the fine avenue leading to the Mission House. 

Now for some days there had been much thunder, 
and dark clouds covered the sky; anyone could tell 
that the rain was near. But for the Konde that was 
just the point. The rain was there, and it was quite 
obviously being withheld. Why else did it not fall? 
And it did fall when the wrong was righted, and the 
prayers offered. Who but a white man could doubt 
the relation of cause and effect? 

One or two local variations are worth noting. At 
Karonga an offering of black cloth is made along with 


212 The Worship of the Spirits 


the other things presented. In many places a pot half 
filled with beer is left all night at the grave where the 
offerings are made, and if the beer is found in the 
morning to have risen to the top, and filled the pot, 
it is a sign that the spirits have agreed to go to God 
with the petition. If it has not risen there is some- 
thing wrong, and the wrong must be made good. It 
sometimes happens that the animal sacrifice is not 
killed, but is kept by the guardian of the grave, and 
belongs thenceforth, with all its issue, to the spirits. 
It is used just like any other cow, but it must not be 
sold. 

An old custom seldom now followed is the children’s 
rain dance. Boys and girls, carrying ashes in pots in 
one hand, and a small branch in the other, go to the 
cross-roads, with a leader who carries a fowl. They 
move with a kind of hopping and leaping dance, and, 
arrived at the cross-roads, they gather around the 
leader, who sings : 


“¢ Let all old things fly away ; we get new things 
from God. His house is great. He has room for 
everything.” 


Ashes and branches are now thrown in a heap, and 
the fowl left there, while the children return as they 
went, with song and dance. 

It is remarkable that while rain is often so difficult 
to bring on, it is in the power of anyone, who has 
just cause, to stop it. But just cause he must have, 
and he must secure the co-operation of the spirits. 


This being done by prayer, offered by the family 


The Worship of the Spirits 213 


representative, or by the chief if he can be induced 
to do so, the person who wishes the rain to stop, ties 
a bunch of feathers to his spear, dips the feathers 
in red ochre, and sets the spear upright in his garden. 
Or if he wishes the prohibition to act over a wide 
area, the spear with the feathers is set up in some 
hidden place among the reeds on the lake shore. The 
rain will presently stop. One man well known to me, 
takes a small piece of polished blackthorn in his hand, 
and wherever he goes the rain stops. His own faith 
in his powers, and the faith of many others, is quite 
beyond dispute. ‘There is an old man not far from 
me whose family has possessed for many generations 
the power of causing the wind to blow, or to cease 
blowing, at will. ‘The old man I speak of 1s believed 
to have exercised his powers quite successfully in 
1923. 

A very few Europeans are believed to possess power 
over the rain. In 1908 a house was being built at the 
Overtoun Institution, Livingstonia, the residence of 
the Scottish missionary, the Rev. Robert Laws, 
C.M.G. ‘The house was still unfinished when the 
rains were due, and no rain fell. At last, some time 
in January, the roofing was finished, and next day 
rain fell in torrents. Dr. Laws had removed the 
embargo! Similar powers are ascribed to another 
well-known missionary, the Rev. Dr. Elmslie of 
Angoniland. Andi still, if the rain is too much or too 
little, the people say, “Ah! it is the Great One at 
Livingstonia. Why is he doing this? ” 

Prayer for rain is offered in one place or another 


214 The Worship of the Spirits 


practically every year; but it is now done in secret, 
an idea having got abroad that the white man dis- 
approves of such practices. Do forbidden acts still 
find a place in these ceremonies? Who can tell? In 
some matters the native is as secret as the grave and 
the European who claims to know “all about it” is a 
deluded man. 


CHAPTER XVII 
The Foretellers 


MONG primitive peoples all over the world, 
the power of certain individuals to foretell 
events, to anticipate the future, 1s pro- 
foundly believed in. Western science has 

so organized life that such methods of meeting the 
future are needless and foolish. Smallpox is met at a 
distance, as are many other diseases, by quarantine 
regulations, by isolation, by skilful treatment when it 
comes. Hunger is warded off by foresight, by careful 
distribution, by skilful farming. The terror of 
heavenly bodies visiting our skies is neutralized by the 
calculations of astronomers published long before- 
hand. 

The Konde have their own way of meeting these 
emergencies. Smallpox is warded off in dreams by 
the prophets. Hunger, in not a few cases, is antici- 
pated by prophetic warning that rain will not fall at 
the usual time, and therefore food stocks must be 
carefully guarded. Eclipses, and even earthquakes, 
are foretold, not by the scientific methods of the 
West, but by the foretellers, whose information is as 
confidently trusted by the Konde, as are the calcula- 


tions of science in more advanced lands. 
215 


216 The Foretellers 


It cannot be asserted that Konde prophecy con- 
tains much that is dramatic. It is true that those 
who were doomed to die in battle were known before- 
hand to the chief and one or two others; but such 
dramatic events as the bloody spectre foretelling 
death at ‘Ticonderoga, at the time an unknown place ; 
or the visions of Highland seers in Scotland; or the 
no less dramatic forecasts of some Hindu priests, are 
not to be found here. Konde prophecy, if one may 
give it that name, was more of an everyday affair, not 
so much concerned with the fate of individuals, as 
with the general welfare. 

There are two classes of foretellers. First are the 
persons already referred to as abakunguluka. ‘Their 
initiation into office has already been described, and 
it is enough to say that the medicines taken, and the 
ceremonies undergone, at the time of their installa- 
tion as subordinate chiefs, gives them power to see in 
dreams all danger to the chief or the community. 
The verb kukunguluka means to go, or fall, down; to 
sink deep ; and the unkunguluka is the man who goes 
down, in dreams, to the underworld, to obtain there 
the word that he is to deliver to the chief. Kusololoka, 
with its noun uasololi, has the same meaning. 

The primary duty of these men was to guard the 
person of the chief from unseen dangers. Anything 
that threatened was seen in dreams, and measures 
taken to ward it off. Witchcraft, illness, poison, 
danger from animals, from falling trees, were thus 
foreseen. But in order effectively to protect him, 
they must know where he is, and what he is doing at 


The Foretellers 217 


a given time. ‘The young chief, Reuben, the account 
of whose installation is given in the chapter on the 
chieftainship, told me that on his return home his 
prophets would tell him that he had been talking with 
me, and would demand an account of all that passed 
between us. These men, it may be here noted, would 
not give me any information about themselves or 
their methods; that was mwiko (forbidden); but 
they had no objection at all to the chief telling me 
all I wished to know. Practically all that is here said 
about them, therefore, is derived from various chiefs, 
and whatever is not so derived is common knowledge, 
which anyone may pick up. 

When the message came to a prophet, he went to 
tell his fellow-prophets, and all together went to the 
chief, to whom all such dreams must be related, 
before publication to the common people, and the 
steps decided upon which are to be taken to ward off 
whatever danger threatens. War was seen, down to 
its smallest details. ‘The dreamer was actually, in 
dreams, present at the fight, and saw both the killed 
and the wounded. ‘The names were given to the 
chief, who, when he marched out with his forces, left 
behind any of these whom he wished to save. ‘The 
people very confidently affrm that just the persons 
named, and no others, were killed. ‘The incredulity 
of the white man is regarded as an entirely uncalled 
for slight upon upright men discharging a duty about 
which, to the Konde, there is no mystery at all. 

The German defeat at Karonga in September, 
1914, was very clearly foretold by Njuli and Mwandisi, 


218 The Foretellers 


both still living near the lake shore ; but the Germans 
knew nothing of the prophecy. ‘he effect of it, 
however, was that no local carriers could be recruited, 
and most of the carriers employed were found among 
the Basango to the north. Next, it was asserted that 
the Germans would evacuate Neu Langenburg with- 
out fighting, which is what actually happened ; and, 
finally, about the same time, it was declared that the 
“* first-comers ’? would become lords of the country. 
These first-comers were Mr. Moir of Glasgow and 
his companions, who hunted elephant north of the 
Songwe River in the early eighties. Dr. Laws of 
Livingstonia visited the north end of the lake much 
earlier, but that visit did not make the same impres- 
sion as the more prolonged stay of Mr. Moir and his 
fellow-hunters. 

Smallpox is the most dreaded scourge in the 
district. It is believed to come from the south, pass 
through the land, and finally to disappear among the 
Basango to the north, to whom the Konde consigned, 
with much gusto, all the evils that they were threat- 
ened or afflicted with. Its coming was foretold by 
the prophets, who declared that it was an act of God 
in punishment of wickedness. But smallpox was 
sometimes brought by the sorcerers. ‘These enemies 
of society were caught in the act—in dreams—by the 
prophets, who also, in dreams, went out to meet and 
repel them. If the evil-doers were caught and 
beaten, their bodies next day would betray them, for 
the dream-fight is a stern reality, and the body bears 
the marks of battle. If the prophets succeeded in 


The Foretellers 219 


driving out all the sorcerers, no one would die of 
smallpox, but one remaining sorcerer could work 
unlimited mischief so long as he remained undis- 
covered. 

In a community which practises ‘“‘ subsistence 
agriculture,” it is important to know beforehand 
when the rains will be late, and it is the duty of the 
prophets to let the chief know, and through him the 
people, when this will happen. In such a contin- 
gency, the chief issues instructions, varying in minute- 
ness, regulating the kinds of food which are to be 
used, and warning against greed. Punishment used 
to follow disregard of the prohibition, but the chiefs, 
although they still issue orders as before, do not now 
venture to punish offenders, or at any rate they 
punish none who would be likely to report them to 
the Administration. 

Famine, however, was not always the result of 
drought. It was often, in the past, the result of war. 
When a powerful enemy approached, the people left 
the villages and took refuge in the bush, sometimes 
for long periods, leaving all that they could not carry 
to fall into the hands of the invader. ‘The last 
occasion on which such a famine was foretold was 
when the Angoni passed through the land seeking a 
habitation. ‘The people fled before them, and a 
famine resulted which is still traditionally remem- 
bered. With such a powerful enemy approaching, 
the prophets had an easy task in foreseeing famine. 

The death of chiefs is also foretold. ‘The prophets 
see in dreams the house of a chief being built in the 


220 The Foretellers 


spirit-world, and they know that when it is finished 
the person for whom it is intended must very soon go 
and occupy it. ‘This vision is not told to the chief, 
but to those who have the duty of choosing his 
successor, who quietly make their arrangements while 
the living chief is still among them. He himself has 
forewarnings also, for he sees his ancestors beckoning 
him, and knows that his hour is near. Common 
people die in the common way. 

No prophecies are more interesting than those 
which concern the European. They are found over a 
wide area in Bantuland, and among the Konde they 
were very detailed and definite. Many versions of 
these prophecies are still current, the most detailed 
being that ascribed to Mwakipesire of Masoko. With 
a great multitude of people the prophet climbed a 
small hill near Masoko, and there delivered his 
message. 


“A man will come from the lake, white in body, 
and he will be lord of the whole country. War he 
will bring to an end, the Angoni he will conquer, 
the Arab he will expel. He will bring us cloth, and 
we shall throw away our garments of leaves. Our 
way of worship will come to an end, for he will tell 
us how to go direct to God Himself; but he will 
not come until all who are here to-day have gone to 
the spirits.” 


Maseke of Karonga added that the white man 
would come in a canoe that sent out smoke, that the 
peace would be so great that none would carry a 


The Foretellers a 


spear, and that the land would be filled with wonders 
of which no man had ever heard. 

How far the original form of these prophecies has 
been modified by experience, I do not undertake to 
say. All who pretend to knowledge of the subject 
vigorously deny any modification. Whether the 
actual performances of the white man have satisfied 
the expectations aroused by the prophecies, is a 
question susceptible of more than one answer. ‘The 
great mass of the people would certainly not rejoice at 
the departure of the Europeans; nevertheless there 
are some who would be glad to see the last of them. 
Long before the Great War, prophecies were freely 
circulating among the people, that the Germans 
would go away, and be succeeded by white men of 
another land. Just now similar prophecies are being 
made about the British, who are to be succeeded by 
another white race as yet unknown. ‘The fact, which 
is well known to many people, that some “ doctors ” 
are seeking for a medicine which will cause the white 
man to disappear, is significant. 

There is a tradition that a series of forecasts was 
made long ago: the Great War, the influenza which 
followed it, the great earthquake of 1g1g, and finally 
a great darkness which is still to come. 

The progress of Christianity has not destroyed the 
faith, especially of the heathen, in the local prophets ; 
and it is not improbable that Christians still retain a 
conviction that these men were not wholly without 
Divine guidance. The chief Swebe, when I asked him 
whether in all cases smallpox foretold had actually 


»2'9 The Foretellers 


come, answered with an emphatic affirmative, and 
with an intonation which clearly meant, ‘“ Why 
should it be doubted?” ‘The spirits form a link 
between men and God, and there is, in the native 
mind, no reason at all to doubt that God can make the 
future known to certain individuals when it is His 
will to do so. The darkness of mind, so often attri- 
buted to the heathen, is not absolute, and they them- 
selves, while readily acknowledging the superiority of 
Christianity, do not admit that they were wholly 
without guidance in the past. 

The second class of foretellers are the abakomwa 
malago, a phrase which may be roughly translated as 
spirit-possessed persons, trance-seers, inspired persons. 
They foretell the future by means of an indwelling 
spirit, but the occupation is always temporary. ‘The 
possessed person runs about calling, “ Listen, listen, 
listen.” His friends seek to restore him by pouring 
water on his head, but if he resists they let him alone, 
believing that he has a message. He breaks away, 
followed by his friends, who carefully note all he 
says. One man known to me climbed, in that con- 
dition, a mountain of two thousand feet, and on 
recovering consciousness was in an exhausted con- 
dition, though he showed no signs of exhaustion while 
in the trance. 

These seers, if we may use a short name for them, 
announce very much the same things as the prophets, 
but they seem to have made the forecasting of animal 
visitations their special province. In 1920 a woman 
called Nakanjere declared that a lion would come 


The Foretellers 223 


and kill many people. ‘The chief, Mwenemusuku, 
protected his land in the manner described in the 
chapter on “’The Powers of Evil,’ and none of his 
people were killed, though the total killed by a lion 
in that year in neighbouring districts was very large. 
A letter in my possession puts the number at forty, 
while others say fifty. Where the chief protected his 
land in the traditional way, the people were safe; 
where this was not done, the toll of human lives was 
great. 

In 1922 the same woman predicted that, for the 
sins of the people, a spotted hyena would kill many. 
Again the chief protected his land, and again no one 
was killed ; while in a neighbouring and unprotected 
land, the death-roll was considerable. In the same 
year leopards were predicted in the Nserya district. 
The chief was urged to sacrifice an ox, but refused. 
Six people were killed, and a number of mauled men 
and women were treated by Dr. Brown at the Mission 
at Itete. 

T’o the Konde, as I have already said, there is no 
difficulty in connecting prediction and fulfilment. 
The inspiration of the foretellers is not doubted ; the 
animals came as foretold ; why should reasonable men 
refuse to acknowledge a relation between the two 
events? At any rate it may be presumed that the 
native will go on seeing a connection, while the white 
man will fall back upon the ever-ready doctrine of 
coincidence, and refuse upon any terms to acknowledge 
any other relation. 

‘There is, however, spirit possession of another kind, 


224. The Foretellers 


which is still a terror to many people: sheer evil 
spirits, who seek to take possession of a human being 
as a dwelling-place. Possessed children hide them- 
selves, crying out, “4bandu, abandu” (men, men). 
Adults reveal their possession by dashing about, 
dancing, shouting. If the possessed makes for water, 
it is known that a water spirit has entered into him ; 
if he goes to the hills, it is a mountain spirit. In 
either case the patient is taken by the medicine man 
to a waterfall, ““where God dwells,” and given 
medicine to drink. If he resists, force is used, but 
frequently the doctor is impressive enough to succeed 
without it. A bell is rung; the doctor speaks, “‘ We 
have found you. Come out of the man.” Then he 
takes water into his mouth and squirts it on the 
breast and back of the afflicted person, striking him 
at the same time with the calabash from which he 
took the water, and holding it for a little over the 
patient’s head. Next he sprinkles the whole body with 
flour, and the party returns to the village, where every 
one is required to drink a medicine administered by 
the doctor ; for when the spirit goes out of its present 
victim, he will seek another dwelling, but the medicine 
protects all who drink it from invasion. The patient 
must not shave his head for six to eight months, nor 
may he eat flesh of any kind. When the period pre- 
scribed is over, the doctor comes to shave the head of 
the patient, who has now recovered, and eats part of a 
fowl which has been treated with yet another medicine. 


CHAPTER XVIII 
Divination & the Lot 


HE fact of death is not regarded by the 
tribes of Central Africa as forming a barrier 
between the living and the dead. ‘The two 
form one community, and the means of 
communication between them are naturally therefore 
well developed. Living and dead are mutually 
dependent, and a certain amount of goodwill must 
necessarily exist between them. What the dead 
cannot do for themselves, the living must do for 
them ; and what the living must know, but do not, 
the dead can tell them if properly interrogated. It is 
upon this fact that divination depends, as do omens 
also to some extent. The use of charms and amulets, 
however, depends upon the other, and perhaps closely 
related fact, that Nature is not a fixed system of laws 
pursuing its way regardless of human needs, but is 
pliable, responsive, and will advise, protect, injure, 
according to the means used by those who possess the 
power. 
The idea that the whole system of consultation of 
the spirits, of the interpretation of omens, and of the 
use of charms and amulets, is based upon conscious 


deception—a few clever men in each community 
P 225 


226 Divination & the Lot 


taking advantage of the credulity of the masses—can 
be entertained only by those who have acquired no 
insight into the native mind and its working. It is 
impossible to maintain that a system, as wide as a 
continent, and as persistent as the centuries, should 
be the outcome of an age-long conspiracy to cheat. 
The human mind does not work in that way. ‘The 
system is involved in the world-view; it is woven 
into the mind-texture of the people, and the honesty 
of the “ practitioners ” is, in many cases, as indubitable 
as the faith of the people. 

The prayer for rain, for instance, is offered with a 
simple sincerity, as honest as any petition ever offered 
in a Christian church. I am not asserting that the 
prayer brings the rain; nor yet that it does not. 
Nor do I suppose that the diviner is in touch with 
fact, when he uses what he considers to be means of 
getting into communication with the spirits. I am 
arguing only for the honesty, in a great majority of 
cases, of the men who do these things. ‘They are men 
with a conviction. 

The diviner usually hands on his knowledge and his 
office to one of his own family ; but an outsider may 
learn his secrets by paying an ox or a cow. | am not 
aware that there is any serious attempt to guard the 
secrets of the profession, though the various drugs 
used are not made known except to those who are 
willing to pay the fee. The only form of initiation is 
the incising of medicines into the arms or wrists of 
the initiate, and this incision may be renewed should 
occasion require it. 


Divination & the Lot 223 


Divining is resorted to primarily in cases of illness : 
to find the cause and suggest the cure. But it is used 
on many other occasions; indeed almost anything that 
one wants to know, he may bring to the diviner. One 
may require information about lost or stolen goods ; 
another may want to know whether a thieving expedi- 
tion will be successful ; and the diviner’s art is at the 
service of both. Success in hunting or fishing may be 
inquired about ; news of absent friends may be had ; 
the reason why the gardens yield a poor crop; will 
the inquirer get work from the European to whom he 
purposes applying, and will the pay be good? These 
and numerous other matters are brought for answer 
to the diviner. ! 

In 1922 the store of an unusually intelligent native 
trader was burned down, and cash to the amount of 
£170 was stolen. The trader went to a diviner, and 
paid him a fee of five pounds, in return for which 
he was informed that after a certain time had passed 
his money would all be restored. About the middle 
of October, 1923, the whole had been paid in, but 
whether the date corresponded with the time given 
by the diviner, I do not know; and it should be added 
that the local magistrate at Karonga took up the case 
with great vigour, a fact which no doubt had its effect. 

I was present in 1902 at an act of divination of which 
I was myself the subject. During the course of a 
long journey I had entered a village with only two 
men, all the other carriers having fallen behind. The 
villagers took me for an “ undesirable,” and refused 
the usual salutations; but when my men arrived, 


228 Divination & the Lot 


they realized that an error had been committed. The 
diviner was called to find out whether I would wish 
to wipe out the insult, and I had the opportunity of 
seeing the process. The diviner, a middle-aged man, 
sat on the ground with a flat stone in front of him, 
and in his hand a short stick about six inches long, 
which he grasped in the middle, while the top was 
held by a lanky youth, evidently anyone chosen at 
random for the purpose. ‘The diviner moved the 
stick up and down, striking it sometimes on the stone, 
sometimes on the ground to right or left of the stone, 
repeating at the same time words of which all I under- 
stood were the word for ‘‘ God,”’ and that for ‘‘ white 
man.” I smiled at the performance, and in a little 
the diviner declared that the spirits refused to speak, 
a result which, as I afterwards learned, was due to my 
incredulous smiles. ‘The same afternoon he and | 
went out together to hunt ; he with bow and arrows, 
I with a modern rifle; and the same ill-success 
attended the efforts of both. 

The methods of divining are many, and only a few 
of them can be given here. The general outline, 
however, is the same, or nearly so, in all cases. Elimin- 
ating questions are asked, gradually limiting the range 
of possibility, until the correct answer has been found. 
Is the sick man going to die? If not, what is the 
disease due to? God? Aspirit? Who? His father? 
Elder brother? etc. etc. What is the disease? Is it 
this, or that, or the other? What does the offended 
spirit want? a cow, sheep, goat? and is it to be 
killed or not? One illustration must suffice. ‘The 


Divination & the Lot 229 


father of a sick child went a few months ago to a 
diviner, who told him that the illness was due to his 
own folly in not sacrificing a cow at the funeral of 
his father, who had died recently. “Go and pray,” 
said the diviner, ‘‘ I will give you no medicine.” After 
prayer, a cow was killed, and due observance made of 
the ritual demanded, after which the child recovered. 
If the sickness is due to the anger of a living person, 
who has persuaded his ancestors to avenge him for 
some wrong done, the diviner directs that an appro- 
priate offering be brought to the offended man, who 
thereupon requests the spirits to remove their anger, 
and the patient recovers. 

A few of the methods may now be briefly described. 

I. Lkipiki, the stick, or cup. A hollowed-out, cup- 
shaped piece of wood, perhaps three inches long, is 
moved backwards and forwards over a piece of banana 
stalk, the open end of the cup downwards, and ques- 
tions are asked as described. When the cup refuses 
to move, the right question has been asked, and the 
answer thereby given. In the act of divination that 
I saw here a few months ago, the diviner seemed 
honestly unable to move the cup, though in my own 
hand it moved easily. 

II. Lstba. ‘The horn of a small buck is filled with 
medicines, and placed with its base on the ground. 
When questions are asked, it begins to sway, and stands 
still again when the right question has been put. 

III. Lsyabwe is a recent importation from another 
district. ‘The diviner, having drunk a medicine called 
mustka, sits on the dark side of the door, having in his 


230 Divination & the Lot 
hand a small calabash partly filled with sand; the 


inquirer sits on the other side of the door. The 
diviner shakes his calabash, saying, “‘Speak, Mulambya, 
who dwellest by the clear waters ; tell me what disease 
this man is suffering from.” He soon begins to feel a 
rising in the throat, which causes him to speak in a 
falsetto voice, “‘ He, tata.” The falsetto now gives 
way to the natural voice, in which the questions are 
put, the answer, coming in falsetto, being the response 
of the spirit. It would be interesting to know whether 
the mustka medicine has qualities which cause the 
throat to contract so as to produce a falsetto voice, 
but the point is one upon which I have no infor- 
mation. 

IV. Wa mmaboko, the hands. When an inquirer 
chooses this method, the diviner goes to the bush, 
whence he takes a kilago, a rush-like grass about 
eighteen inches in length. Detaching the rootlets, he 
chews them carefully, and spits the juice into his 
hands. ‘The palms being rubbed smoothly over each 
other, the questions are put, and when the hands 
stick, the answer has been given. 

V. Kayamba, the tortoise. The intestines of the 
tortoise are removed, and a cord passed through the 
mouth and the anus. The cord is held upright by 
the left hand, while the tortoise is lifted with the 
right as each question is put. When the right question 
is asked, the tortoise, instead of falling to the ground, 
stops half-way on the string. This form of divination 
is very widely known among the tribes around Lake 


Nyasa. 


Divination & the Lot 74 2 
VI. Indeko, the pot. An axe-head 1s fixed upright 


in the ground, and a pot containing water and medi- 
cine is balanced on the edge. If the pot falls and 
breaks, the patient will not recover; if it keeps its 
balanced position, he will soon be well. The diviner 
Mwankosore, who showed me this method, added 
that in the case of an illness discovered by this method 
to be due to witchcraft, he gave his walking-stick to 
the patient, who immediately got up and walked, 
perfectly whole. I shall have occasion again to refer 
to recoveries of this nature. 

When the diviner is consulted with regard to theft, 
a different procedure is followed. 

I. Ikifwani, the image. ‘This savours more of 
magic than of divining, but it is placed here because 
it is called by the latter name by those who practise 
it. An incident which took place in 1918 will make 
the method clear. In that year there was scarcity of 
food, and consequent theft from gardens and store- 
houses. One man went to the diviner, and asked him 
to find the goods and the thief. The diviner took a 
small image of a man, about two feet in height, made 
from a block of wood. In the head was a cavity, into 
which medicine was put, and the cavity closed. ‘The 
party went to the garden from which the food had 
been stolen, and, the image being laid on the ground, 
the diviner prayed to it to lead them to the thief. It 
was then taken up in the right hand of a strong man, 
and presently began to shake violently, so that it could 
with difficulty be held. In a little it swayed in one 
direction, and the holder moved thither, the whole 


232 Divination & the Lot 


party following, until the shaking of the image ceased 
ina garden. Digging at that spot, the stolen food was 
discovered ; and the image, being asked now to find 
the thief, led them to a certain house, the owner of 
which at once confessed the theft, and paid a cow 
as fine. A similar incident occurred in 1919, when a 
number of hoes were stolen. The person accused by 
the image vigorously denied guilt, but gave in when 
threatened with the poison test, and paid a cow as 
fine. In this case the confession, as indeed in both 
cases, may have been due to fear of what would 
happen in the poison ordeal, and the fine paid rather 
than undergo further trials, even although the accused 
persons were not really guilty. 

II. Ulupembe, the horn. Recently a cow was stolen, 
and the owner went to a diviner for help, taking with 
him a piece of the halter by which the cow had been 
tethered in the house. The diviner made a fire by 
rubbing two sticks together, and as the smoke ascended, 
he added to the smouldering fire tiny bits of the rope, 
along with some of his own medicines, and as the 
smoke increased, the diviner directed it to go towards 
the village where the thief lived. N oting the direc- 
tion in which the smoke moved, he told the owner to 
wait until some one died in that village, at the same 
time bidding him on no account weep for the dead 
man, for then the medicine would kil] him also. If 
the bladder of the first person to die showed signs of 
blackness, there need be no doubt that he was the thief, 
and his friends would be obliged to pay over a cow. 
For the nearest relative of the dead man would go 


Divination & the Lot 233 


to the diviner to find out the cause of the discolora- 
tion, and would of necessity make reparation. 

III. A few years ago a policeman had his goods 
stolen at Mwaya. Instead of reporting to the proper 
quarters, he went to a diviner, who sprinkled the 
policeman’s house with medicine, which he publicly 
declared would kill the thief, and in a short time the 
goods were brought to the chief of the district. The 
deception in this case is too obvious to call for 
comment. 

Inquiries regarding hunting and fishing, and every 
other kind of question, are conducted in ways similar 
to those already given. Employment with a white 
man is evidently still a matter for careful considera- 
tion, and it is entirely possible that the diviner pre- 
vents many a man from going to work who would 
otherwise be glad to go. “Shall I find work?” ‘Shall 
I find peace?” “Shall I get good wages?” The 
second question is much the most important, and 
means, “Shall I be employed by a white man who is 
not a perpetual scold?” the kind of European whom 
the native hates and fears more than anything else. 

The fee paid to the diviner varied from about a 
halfpenny to an ox or a cow. 

While there is undoubtedly deliberate cheating and 
charlatanry, these should be regarded, not as the 
essence of the system, but its excrescence. In many 
cases, if not in all, the diviner has subconsciously 
decided what answer shall be given ; in the region of 
the subconscious his mind is made up, and, there 
being no opposing idea, the “ mental process issues in 


234 Divination & the Lot 


a conation which passes over into the physical motor 
response ”’ (Tansley). ‘The image in the mind, of the 
divining rod acting in the manner conceived, tends to 
become a physical fact, and the rod comes to a halt 
in obedience to a previously formed decision, of which 
the operator is, in most cases, not consciously aware. 
Nevertheless the opportunities for deception are many. 

Ifipendo, the lot. ‘The lot is resorted to in a variety 
of cases, but its application is much more limited than 
that of divination. 

I. When divination has decided that an illness is 
due to poison, the lot is invoked to find the poisoner. 
Little pieces of dough are kneaded into as many tiny 
cups as there are persons suspected. Into each is put 
a small quantity of mwafi. (the poison used for the 
ordeal), and the suspected persons are then invited to 
take each the cup that he selects for himself, the 
preparations having been made, of course, in their 
absence. ‘I'he guilty person is he who takes the cup 
in which the poison remains unabsorbed into the 
dough, the others being assumed to have vomited. 
This might just as well be called a way of undergoing 
the poison ordeal, but as it is called ifipendo it is 
included here. 

II. In cases of disputed inheritance no poison is 
put into the cups, but a little dry four. The claimant 
who selects the cup in which the moisture from the 
dough has penetrated to the dry flour is declared to 
be the rightful heir. 

When the rain stops, and no natural cause can be 
assigned, it is assumed to be the act of some person 


Divination & the Lot 235 


unknown. Now when a common man stops the rain, 
he must first have obtained the assistance of his chief ; 
and the chief, being discovered by the method just 
described, must take measures to have the evil undone. 

III. Ifa question arises as to the ownership of some 
article, small sticks are set upright in the ground. ‘The 
claimants sit each opposite his own stick, and he whose 
stick first falls, if it falls towards him, is the rightful 
owner. But if the stick falls towards another person, 
then that person is declared the owner. Finally, if 
goods of any kind are divided into lots, one lot for 
each of a number of persons, sticks are taken, marked 
to correspond with the lots. Each shareholder picks 
out a stick, the marks, of course, not being shown to 
him, and gets the goods which correspond to the 
marks. ‘l‘here is no appeal, the decision of the lot 
is final. 

The poison ordeal, though now prohibited, and 
administered only in secret, was, until European 
government began to put it down, so common that 
a description of it comes in appropriately in any chapter 
dealing with native life; and as it has been referred 
to here already, the method of administering to indi- 
viduals will be given now, leaving administration to a 
whole community for the chapter on ‘‘ Witchcraft.” 
The ordeal was applied for reasons grave or trivial, from 
an accusation of murder down to a petty family quarrel 
of no importance except in a moment of ill-temper. 
Both parties to a quarrel or an accusation went to 
the doctor, and stated their case. He took a piece 
of bark of the mwafi tree for each, raised it a little in 


236 Divination & the Lot 


his hand and let it fall to the ground ; if one turned 
round in falling and the other fell without turning, 
the doctor knew beforehand which was the guilty 
person—he whose bark turned round in falling. ‘The 
poison was then prepared from the bark by the doctor, 
by whom it was administered next day. ‘he one 
who vomited was in the right, the other in the wrong. 
Assuming that the poison was honestly adminis- 
tered, that is to say, that the doctor did not give a 
strong mixture to one and a weak to another, which 
he very probably did in-many cases, must it be assumed 
that the result was merely fortuitous? Is it not 
a psychological possibility that the consciousness of 
guilt in the one case, and of innocence in another, 
causes the poison in the stomach to act in the way 
that generations of belief in its efficacy has led the 
whole community to expect that it would act? I do 
not suggest that this happened in all cases. No doubt 
the generations have seen countless cases of tragic 
miscarriage of justice; on the other hand, so many 
confessions have followed conviction under the ordeal, 
that it is difficult to believe that in all cases the 
discovery of the guilty person was a mere fortuity. 


CLAP LER: bx 
Omens & Portents 


O us the universe is continually offering the 

gift of knowledge. The earth and the starry 

heavens, all that goes on in the human 

mind, and all men’s actions, are subjects of 
inquiry. But our gift has to be received with toil of 
heart and brain, for it is granted only to men of 
mental vigour. 

‘To the Konde, on the other hand, what the universe 
offers is not so much knowledge as foreknowledge ; 
information rather than education. Prescience, per- 
haps because the Konde is so distrustful of his own 
unaided powers, is more to him than the heaped-up 
lore of the centuries. Everything is in the hands of 
unseen powers, and it 1s important for weak men to 
know beforehand what is the attitude of these powers 
to any undertaking he may have in mind. 

Nature is not, to the African, a fixed system of laws 
that cannot be interfered with; men can and do 
interfere with it; stop the rain, injure the crops, 
make serpents, call up lions and leopards, and many 
other things. Now it might almost a priori be asserted 
that such a system will not stop at being controllable : 
it will also be predictive, it will give signs and tokens 

237 


238 Omens & Portents 


of what is coming. But these signs and tokens are 
not the act of an impersonal universe; they are the 
act of God, a revelation of His care for men. 

In Konde omens and portents the dramatic element 
is slight. I can retail nothing to equal in creepiness 
the cry of the Irish banshee, or Highland dogs bark- 
ing at an invisible funeral, or the family ghost clank- 
ing its chain in an old English mansion. But a Konde 
dog howls at night, and sudden silence falls upon the 
previously laughing and chatting company sitting 
around the fire, or out in the cool moonlight. Who 
is going to die? And when? And of what sickness? 
Or a branch creaks in the forest as one is passing 
through it at night ; and the belated traveller hastens 
his steps without looking backward, for that way lies 
death. The bold man who passes the grave of a chief 
at night, and hears his name called, takes to his heels, 
eyes front for his very life, for the backward look is 
death, though to the closed eye there is little danger 
that cannot be averted. 

Omens are offered by nature; they come spon- 
taneously, so far as men are concerned. ‘There are 
cases in which the omens are consulted, or taken, but 
generally the information is given by events, rather 
than discovered by experiment, as with the ancient 
Roman augurs. And although some men know more 
about them than others, there are no specialists to 
whom a fee has to be paid for the interpretation of 
the omen. 

The rough classification which is here attempted, 
makes no pretence of being exhaustive. Life is full 


Omens & Portents 239 


of hints and tokens of the goodwill or illwill of the 
unseen powers, and the wise man is he who profits by 
them where that is possible ; where it is not possible, 
he is the wise man who quietly awaits the event, 
thankful that at least the misfortune does not take 
him at unawares, and that, if he cannot ward off the 
danger, he can meet it with an equanimity impossible 
to one upon whom the blow falls suddenly. 

1. Weather lore is strangely absent, perhaps be- 
cause in the tropics there is a regularity about the 
weather which renders prognostication as unnecessary 
as barometers. If, on a rainy evening, the crow caws 
on a high note, it will be hot the next day, with a 
cloudless sky ; if on a low note the rain will continue. 
Another token of rain is given when the long-necked, 
long-legged birds, mwankusye, fly in a line abreast 
towards the lake. 

2. Of bad news there are countless indications ; of 
good news only a very few hints have come to light. 
Twitching of the upper eyelid indicates good fortune 
of some kind undefined ; but if the twitching is in 
the lower lid, death is near, of the person whose eye 
twitches, or of a friend. 

3. Before the settlement of the country by the 
Europeans, long journeys were rarely undertaken, and 
omens on the way were carefully watched for, and as 
carefully heeded when they were given. Serpents 
are the most trusted mediums and great significance 
is attached to their movements. A serpent lying on 
one side of the path, and slipping into the bush on 
that side as the travellers approach, indicates a clear 


24.0 Omens & Portents 


path. But if the serpent crosses to the other side and 
into the bush, the way is closed, and the travellers 
will return to their homes,.no matter how near their 
destination they may be. “What will happen if they 
continue their journey is not clear; some undefined 
evil will overtake them. Parties on the war-path 
heeded this warning, for it was an omen of defeat if 
they went on, which, naturally, they never did. If 
the snake escapes into a hole, it indicates a death at 
the nearest village; and if a python is seen on the 
road, the travellers, whose path is not closed, may 
expect to find the death-wail going on at the first 
village they come to. 

A two-headed snake, whatever that may be, is a 
sure sign of death at the place one is going to; and 
two snakes fighting indicate coming evil, which can 
only be averted by returning to the place whence one 
has set out. A tree falling across a path, is another 
warning, which no man disregards ; but the tree must 
fall within view of the person to whom the hint is 
given; trees that have fallen otherwise have no 
significance. But it is worth noting that natives 
travelling with white men pay no heed to any omens. 
They are protected by the power of the European, 
and any significance the omens may have is his 
affair. 

4. Travellers have their tokens on the way: the 
people to whom they go have foretokens of their 
approach. If the fire “ speaks,” if it makes a burring 
noise in the flame; if the hens go about uttering low 
cries; if amayogobera, small black birds with white 





DANCING AT A FEAST. 


The dance includes striking contortions, supported in the air, as this woman is. Boys 
standing on the ground will bend backward until their heads come near their thighs. 
Walking on the hands, throwing a somersault, doing a catherine wheel are all in the 
native mind dancing, and may be indulged in at any moment, as it occurs to the dancer. 










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Omens & Portents 241 


breasts, sit on a tree near the house; if mwanjala, 
little black and white birds of another species, hop 
about twittering; the approach of strangers is fore- 
told. Hospitality to strangers is a primary virtue 
among the Konde, and food is prepared at once; but 
it is not cooked until they actually arrive. To offer 
them food already cooked, is to offer a cold welcome, 
and possibly to do an injury ; for cold food must not 
be eaten by chiefs, nor by hunters, nor by doctors, for 
in all these cases the effect would be to destroy the 
power of the medicines by virtue of which they are 
assured of success in their various callings. 

5. Omens having reference to food are numerous, 
and a few examples must suffice. If a fly goes into 
one’s mouth, it is a sure sign that the person will 
soon be eating flesh, a rare treat for the Konde, who 
seldom eat flesh, unless there is an occasion for it: a 
birth, a marriage, or a death. But the fly indicates 
none of these ; the flesh hinted at is a pure gift with 
no kind of condition attached. The same good 
fortune is suggested if a child eats cinders from the 
fire-place. A leopard crying all night in the neigh- 
bourhood is giving information that some one has 
broken a food prohibition. New season’s food has 
been eaten before the chief has laid an offering of the 
first-fruits of that particular food-stuff at the grave 
of his ancestors, and the dwellers in the underworld 
are angry at the insult offered them. The chief is 
informed of the crying of the leopard, and the 
diviner is called in to find the culprit. 

There is a common grass called ditika, which in 

Q 


24.2 Omens & Portents 


appearance is not unlike malesi, from which beer is 
made. If anyone eats this while there is abundance 
of proper food, it isan omen of famine tocome. Ifthe 
offender is a child, he is not beaten; but if he is 
grown up, he is mercilessly dealt with. It is not pre- 
tended that the beating averts the evil, nor has the 
man’s action in eating the ditika anything to do with 
the coming famine, except to foretell it. If one asks, 
Why then is he beaten? the answer is simply that 
having foretold evil he deserves to be beaten. ‘This 
unpalatableness of plain truth (if it is plain truth) is 
not unknown among other races than the Bantu. 

6. Elephants while being hunted impart a great 
deal of varied information to the hunters. As elephant 
hunting by natives has long been prohibited, the 
omens afforded are no longer available, but that does 
not affect the belief in them. ‘‘’The elephant does 
not lie” is an assured conviction in the minds of the 
hunters, and when an omen was given, the hunt was 
abandoned until the matter was investigated. 

If, as the hunters approach, elephants are found 
leaping upon each other, a halt is called; both 
because in that condition they are specially dangerous, 
and because the omen is otherwise bad. ‘There is sin 
among the hunters, and the whole party returns to 
the fitembe, the temporary quarters erected for the 
hunting period. There the case is gone into. Some 
one has wronged his neighbour in the manner sug- 
gested by the action of the elephants, and nothing 
can be done until it is put right. To go on with the 
hunt would be the extremest folly, and if no one 


Omens & Portents 243 


confesses, the party returns to the village, and the 
diviner is called to discover the culprit. 

If two elephants are found kneeling and facing 
each other, some one’s wife has erred in his absence, 
and the hunt is stopped until justice is done. An 
elephant taking up dust with his trunk and offering 
it to another, shows that some one has offered snuff 
to another man’s wife, a most significant action, 
demanding immediate satisfaction. If an elephant is 
seen touching the teats of another, a similar action 
has been committed in the village, and again the hunt 
stops for inquiry and punishment. ‘Trumpeting 
elephants are a sign of quarrelling in the village, and 
one plastering its face with mud is a sign of death, 
for the women at the death-wail cover their faces 
with mud or chalk. The hunters return, and do not 
resume until all is clear again. It is most important 
that not only the hunters should be free from evil, 
but their friends also, for evil brings them into danger, 
and it is the duty of all in the village to see that the 
natural dangers of the hunt are not increased by un- 
natural evil in their homes. 

7. War was foretold by the prophets, but con- 
firmatory signs were usually not wanting. If the 
horns of the new moon were of unequal length, an 
enemy was known to be approaching ; necessarily an 
enemy from a distance, for the phenomenon must 
have been visible over a wide area. ‘The same terror 
was announced by a cow bellowing at night, if there 
was no known cause for its outcry. This, naturally, 
is a thing of the past, as war, at least native war, has 


24.4 Omens & Portents 


ceased. What significance would now be attached to 
these omens, I do not know. ‘The buffalo, like the 
elephant, does not lie, and wise men heed its warnings. 
Many years ago a man called Masapa went to the 
Kinga region, where he quarrelled with the people, 
and barely escaped with his life. His chief, Mwaisumo, 
took up the quafrel, and prepared to invade the 
enemy’s territory, undeterred by the predictions of 
defeat which came in dreams to his prophets, until, 
on the way, one of his men was killed by a buffalo, 
and this was a warning not to be disregarded. On 
their return home, they were received by their women 
folks, not with contempt and mocking, but as wise 
men, who were too wary to tempt “‘ Providence ’’ by 
foolish action. One more war omen. If a man, on 
the point of leaving for the field of battle, was 
suddenly, but accidentally, seized by the wrist by his 
wife, he laid down his weapons, and quietly stayed at 
home ; not for him the joy of battle ; he would have 
been killed, and no one thought the worse of him for 
heeding the omen. 

8. Foretokens of death are so numerous that it is 
difficult even to classify them. Whatever is rare, or 
unnatural, or sudden, may be taken as a warning of 
approaching death. A mole seen by day, is a rare 
event, and full of dread. A Christian living near me 
saw this wonder in February, 1923, and in the same 
month he got news of the death of a friend a hundred 
miles away! No connection? He thought there was. 
To see the kasuchi, a small aquatic animal, is to see 
something so rare that its appearance must be the 


Omens & Portents 24.5 


foretoken of widespread death; but no one known 
to me has had the misfortune to see it. Foxes are 
said to have increased so greatly since the advent of 
the white man, that no significance is now attached 
to their crying; but a generation ago it announced 
the approaching death of a great chief. ‘There was 
an interesting recrudescence of this belief in 1914. In 
July of that year there was a great barking of foxes in 
the neighbourhood of the Overtoun Institution (out- 
side the Konde country). The news spread far, and 
the general anticipation of widespread disaster was 
held to have been amply justified when the first 
intimation of the Great War was received. A dog 
howling at night, surely nothing uncommon, still 
predicts death, and the dog is beaten, not because its 
howling brings on the evil, or because the beating 
can avert it; it foretells misfortune, and the forecast 
is unwelcome, and the unfortunate retailer of infor- 
mation must suffer for lack of common sense. 

A cock crowing at night, when no cock should 
crow, is a foretoken of death, and in the first place of 
its own; no second time would that cock be the 
harbinger of news so unwelcome. Sudden things, 
again, an unexpected collapse of a house which looks 
strong, or of a tree which shows no sign of decay ; 
or of a grave which is being digged, or a pot of beer 
which falls without obvious cause; these are all of 
dreadful omen, indicating the death of a chief. The 
father of the present chief Kabeta, living near 
Rungwe, was a great planter of trees. As he lay 


dying, all the trees which he had planted in his youth 


246 Omens & Portents 


fell one after another, and when Kabeta went to his 
fathers, he had no more trees to his credit than when 
he was born. ‘The fall of the village tree, planted at 
the installation of the chief, shows that he in whose 
honour it was planted is about to go to the spirit- 
land. 

g. The heavens give very few signs. If the full 
moon is red, with a red circle around it, plague 1s 
coming. If the sun “builds a house” (nmbus), 
some woman is about to give birth to twins. Worst 
of all, naturally, is an eclipse. ‘‘ Kyala asambwike,” 
they say, “God has lost patience, He is going to kill 
us all,” and they go out with drums and wild shout- 
ings to induce the Supreme Being to go away to the 
Basango. 

What has been described in the foregoing para- 
graphs is called kusura, to foreshadow, forecast, the 
agent being entirely unconscious of the significance 
of the action. ‘There is another class of actions 
which also forecast ; but although the difference is not 
very obvious, a different word 1s used, kustkura, which 
sometimes means to insult, but commonly to act as a 
pointer to coming evil. Such actions are mostly un- 
natural; many of them are in themselves evil, and 
their occurrence is regarded as a portent. 

1. Unnatural anger. Anger in a child is a pheno- 
menon of awe. If a grown-up person arouses 1t—not 
in his own child—that person has received warning 
that his death is near. How this comes about is not 
clear. Some natives say that the anger is a sign, 
which cannot be explained; others that the child 


Omens & Portents 24.7 


has a disease, from which he does not himself suffer, 
but which passes over to the person who arouses the 
wrath. 

At Karonga, if two old men fight with their fists, 
and tear each other’s garments, they have forecasted 
death for each other. The death of a friend of one 
or the other will shortly take place. Among the 
Banyakyusa to the north, the fight of any two, young 
or old, with fists only, is a portent of the same signifi- 
cance. Such anger blazes up suddenly, and the two 
men fly at each other in blind fury, unable to restrain 
themselves sufficiently to go and fetch the weapons 
with which reasonable men fight. ‘The fist as a 
weapon of war is not highly regarded by Africans 
generally, however dear it may be to others. 

2. Unnatural actions. To invite an old man to 
climb a tree may seem to us more laughable than 
deadly ; but to the Konde it is a dreadful combina- 
tion of insult and forecast; it is a forecast, because 
such a thing is an insult so great as to be in itself a 
portent. The number of things that come under 
this head is legion ; but generally, to ask an old person 
to do what is unnatural for an old person to do, 1s 
kusikura. little girls quite innocently removing 
their scanty covering in the presence of an old man, 
have unwittingly warned him that his days are near 
an end. Perhaps under the same category we may 
include an invitation given by a child to an old 
man to come and eat; to us it could not come in 
a more charming way; but the old Konde would 
turn his back indignantly on the ill-bred brat who 


248 Omens & Portents 


so insulted him. This does not apply to an invitation 
to drink beer, but no one can explain why there is 
a difference. 

3. Accusations against a man of good character 
come under the same heading. Some evil has been 
done, and the wrong-doer has not been discovered. 
Then, perhaps in joke, or it may be out of personal 
dislike, some one says that so and so did it. The 
person referred to knows that his days will not be 
long in the land. “ Did I ever do a thing like that? ” 
he asks indignantly. ‘ Why, then, am I accused?” 
It can only be kusikura, and he expects to die, at the 
best, within a year or two. 

4. If the spirits, in dreams, offer food, it must not 
be accepted, even in the dream: to accept it means 
death. 

Connected with the foregoing, but having a 
different name among the Konde, are insults or 
injuries to parents. A man who fights with his father, 
and throws him down, has achieved the final wicked- 
ness. Whether the old man was right or wrong in the 
matter in dispute is of no consequence; the whole 
community expresses its abhorrence of the deed. 
‘* Has this man reached even to God? ” that is to say, 
does he consider himself the equal of God, that he 
does such things? Word is sent to the chief, and the 
whole district is informed of the evil thing that has 
been done. There is no formal denunciation, no 
spoken curse ; but the ckugune, the curse of all fathers, 
and of all ancestors, is upon the son. He becomes 
lame; then unable to stand upright ; finally he 


Omens & Portents 24.9 


crawls about on his buttocks, a helpless object. The 
curse has taken effect. 

After a time good-natured people try to bring 
father and son together again. The son is persuaded 
to make his father an offering of an ox or a cow in 
token of repentance. If the father agrees, a day is 
fixed, and the whole community, including the little 
children, assembles at the house of the injured father. 
Beer is prepared, the ox is killed, the son publicly 
expresses his repentance, and the father his accept- 
ance thereof. ‘Then the people, having heard all the 
details of the crime, express their feelings in a pro- 
longed groan. A dose of medicine is now given to 
the son, a stick is put into his hands, and he is bidden 
to rise and walk, which he does in the presence of all ! 
A similar curse falls upon the man who does evil 
with one of his father’s wives; and there are a very 
few other crimes which automatically bring on the 
same punishment. 

It is not difficult, from the point of view of modern 
mental science, to explain the facts. The disability 
is due to the conviction in the mind of the younger 
man, strengthened by a similar conviction in the 
mind of the whole community, that such results 
always follow deeds like his. Similar phenomena are 
by no means unknown among Europeans, where the 
response to each other of mind and body is not so 
immediate as it 1s among the more unsophisticated 
Konde. ‘The man bearing his sin is mentally, perhaps, 
rather than physically, unable to stand upright ; and 
the conviction having been removed from his mind, 


250 Omens & Portents 
the disability naturally leaves his body. Relax the 


conviction, and the disease will be relaxed; destroy 
it, and the disease will vanish, having no objective 
reality. 

But how do the people regard the whole event? 
What has caused the disability, and what has removed 
it? There can be no doubt as to the answer. Sin 
and its consequences in the one case; reconciliation 
and consequent removal of the penalty in the other. 
This explanation, though held by native Christians, 
is also held by the heathen ; and in any case it is not 
the teaching of Christianity to-day that diseases due 
to sin are removed immediately reconciliation between 
God and man has taken place, so that even a knowledge 
of Christian doctrine would not explain the presence 
of the conviction in the native mind. The idea, if 
not the form of words, is found, at least in germ, in 
every act of propitiation offered to offended spirits ; 
the appropriate offering having been made, and 
reconciliation effected, the penalty passes away. 


CHAPTER XX 
The Powers of Evil: I. Witchcraft 


ELIEF in witchcraft is not among the things 

that are passing away. So universal is the 

belief in its malign powers that anyone, 

except a Christian, who dares to express 
doubts on the matter, is himself in danger of being 
denounced as a practiser of the black art. It fills the 
whole outlook of the common people. If one is per- 
sistently ill, and medicines do not cure him, he sus- 
pects some one of practising against him; if children 
die one after the other, both parents cannot escape 
suspicion, one or other is guilty ; if cattle do not give 
a normal quantity of milk, some one has bewitched 
them. And there is not a house in all heathen Konde- 
land that is not, in one way or another, or in many 
ways, protected by charms and medicines against the 
power of witchcraft. 

Witchcraft in Europe is a power gained by traffic 
with the Evil One, and used by the possessor either 
for his or her own ends, or hired out for payment. 
Now among the Konde an wndost, witch or wizard, 
is as much the creation of God as other men are. 


“God has made men in many images,” 


and upon a 
few He has bestowed those mysterious and evil powers 


251 


2i5i2 Witchcraft 


in the presence of which common men, if unprotected, 
are so helpless. 

While common men dread nothing so much as an 
accusation of witchcraft, there are swaggering fellows, 
great doctors and others, who boast openly of their 
powers; and so great is the dread in which they are 
held, that no one dares to cross them, or to have them 
brought to trial. All chiefs of any standing are 
credited with the power of witchcraft, but in their 
case it 1s supposed to be a special endowment to 
enable them to maintain their position against evil- 
doers. 

Witchcraft is hereditary; men and women are 


born with it; born with two isota, serpents, in the 
stomach, by the power of which they can leave the 


body, and go about at night, unseen, to work their 
evil will on man and beast. Ifa parent is undosi, the 
children will be also; but if an expectant mother 
knows that her husband is a wizard, she will take care 
to have her child born at a distance, so that it cannot 
inherit its father’s undesirable powers. If inherited 
from the mother, it is of peculiar virulence; but if 
from the father, the powers sometimes lie quiescent, 
and do no harm to anyone. If the post mortem reveals 
tokens of witchcraft on the left side, it has come 
from the mother ; if on the right, from the father. 
The Konde recognize three degrees of power, or of 
wickedness, in witchcraft. There are the compara- 
tively harmless persons who drink the milk of cows at 
night, but do no other harm; their punishment, if 
discovered, is to herd the cattle the whole of the next 


Witchcraft 253 


day; next, those who destroy men and cattle, and 
everything else, by means of their hidden powers ; 
and finally, the creators of lions, leopards, crocodiles, 
and eagles, who are the worst enemies of society, but 
who are held in such fear that they are seldom 
molested. "The official dreamers, already frequently 
referred to, have one isota, serpent, in the stomach, 
but they are not called wizards; they are witch 
destroyers, or at least discoverers, for they have the 
power of seeing in dreams what these evil men are 
doing, and in dreams going out to fight them. And if, 
in the dream, the dreamer kills the snake with which 
he fights, the owner will be found dead in the morning. 

Perhaps one of the commonest charges of witch- 
craft is made in connection with the milk supply. As 
a rule, in December, the chief sends out word that he 
expects the milk supply to be good for the year; if 
it turns out to be less than was expected, and if there 
has been no drought, it is obvious that there has been 
undue interference, and that on a great scale, with the 
cattle. ‘The whole of the people of the affected 
district are summoned to the chief’s village, and put 
to the test; each person bringing all the cattle he 
possesses. "There are two tests: by the ear, and by 
the stomach, that is to say by poison. ‘The people 
sit in a great circle, and one after another comes up 
to the doctor, who bores the ear with a sharp instru- 
ment; if the ear is easily bored, the person is inno- 
cent: if the skin is tough, and resists, he is guilty, 
and is ordered to sit on one side, where he is joined 
by all others who are found out in the same way. 


254 Witchcraft 


But each person who is declared innocent goes at once, 
without further parley, to take charge of the cattle 
which he brought to the meeting. From the guilty 
persons everything is taken away : cattle, hoes, cooking 
pots, food stocks; and men are sent at once to burn 
down their houses. The live stock is the property of 
the chief, and it is mostly killed on the spot, and eaten, 
or dried, before the assembly departs; while the 
wretched criminals are sent out into the world, home- 
less and in poverty. ‘They are not always expelled 
from the district, but they usually prefer to go to 
another chief. 

The poison test has the same results for the guilty ; 
but every individual is not necessarily tested. From 
each village one man is taken, and he drinks for the 
whole of that community. If he vomits, not only he, 
but all the village which he represents is innocent. 
If he does not, it does not follow that he is himself 
the guilty person, but only that the criminal (or 
criminals) will be found in his village. ‘They are taken 
individually, and the poison administered, the inno- 
cent vomiting, and the guilty failing to do so. ‘The 
decoction is never strong enough among the Konde to 
kill, and therefore other punishments must be found. 
Not infrequently a dog or a cock is made to take the 
poison, the results being credited or debited to the 
person for whom it stands. 

The “smelling out” of witches is not generally 
practised ; but there is a woman at ‘Tukuyu, a stout 
young woman with a hearty laugh, who has the power 
of picking out the innocent when a general accusation 


Witchcraft 255 


of witchcraft is made. The people are assembled by 
order of the chief, and the woman walks slowly round 
the circle, gazing into the eyes of each person, and 
eliminating the innocent one by one, using no other 
test than the look in the individual’s eyes. ‘Uhose 
who remain are guilty. 

Prosperity in another arouses all the evil passions of 
witches and wizards. But prosperity in itself was, 
until lately, evidence that the prosperous person was 
himself a wizard. There is a woman living not far 
from me who was accused before the British magis- 
trate of pretending to exercise witchcraft, and to 
obtain cattle and other goods by threatening violence. 
She was dismissed on technical grounds, but ordered 
‘not to return to her own district. In conversation 
with her after the trial she told me that it was only 
the presence of the white man that saved her from 
being burned alive as a witch; the evidence against 
her being the rapid increase of her live stock. But 
the increase, she assured me, was “ the gift of God.” 

Death by burning was the ancient penalty when 
that was inflicted publicly ; but when the witches or 
wizards themselves undertook to kill a fellow-sorcerer 
in jealousy, they did it in another way. Leaving their 
bodies behind them, they go to the house of the 
victim, enter by the roof, disturbing nothing ; and 
finally enter the stomach of the sleeping person. 
Thence they wander about to lungs, heart, or liver, 
and wound him with their “secret spears.” Next 
day the man is ill, and the day following he dies:ilf 
the post mortem reveals ulcers on heart, lungs, or liver, 


256 Witchcraft - 


it is entirely satisfactory evidence that death was due 
to witchcraft. ‘The whole population is called up, 
and the chief directs the application of the poison 
test, in the manner already described. If the culprits 
are not discovered, they bring the body of the victim 
to the surface without disturbing the soil (an art the 
secret of which is now confined to a very few persons), 
and indulge in a ghoulish cannibal feast. At Karonga 
in 1913 a suspicion arose that this had happened, and 
men who had enjoyed the benefits of many years’ 
training at the Overtoun Institution told me that 
they did not believe that such things happened now, 
since Christ had destroyed the powers of evil, but 
they had no doubt whatever that they happened 
frequently in the past. 

Smalipox is popularly supposed to be due, in many 
cases, to witchcraft. ‘The witches go to Karonga, or 
elsewhere, and bring the disease back in a goatskin 
bag. But not unseen: the ever-watchful dreamers 
see them, and go out to fight them ; but it would seem 
that there must be occasions when the powers of good 
are Overcome or outwitted by the powers of evil; for 
smallpox does get in; and the question arises, has it 
been sent by God, or brought in by wicked persons? 
The question is soon answered, for plagues brought 
in by Divine agency never show a long death-roll: 
God does not do such things. It is the work of the 
witches, and the test is administered, and the evil- 
doers punished. It need hardly be added that the 
poison test is prohibited, and also the ear test, by 
European government, and that if it is resorted to 


Witchcraft a 


at all, it is done in secret. But other methods are in 
use that are not so easy to detect. A suspected person 
is mercilessly beaten, and there are many who have, 
under stress of such thrashings, confessed their guilt, 
lest the thrashing end in death. In the good old 
days, before the Europeans began to interfere, guilty 
persons might be burned to death with all their 
family. ‘To-day, if the chief is afraid to take more 
drastic steps, the suspected person is warned to 
depart. Coming out in the morning he finds at his 
door a banana stem, with leaves tied to the top; and 
if he refuses the hint, he may be mobbed the same 
day. Native law gives him the privilege of challenging 
the poison test, and the unhappy chief in that case 
must either agree and risk being denounced to the 
magistrate, or refuse to apply the test and withdraw 
the charge. The lot of the chief who has to steer his 
way between native and British law is not always a 
happy one. In the case I am supposing, if he agrees 
to the poison test in the hope of escaping the atten- 
tions of the police, he may find himself with two 
deaths on his hands, for both accuser and accused 
must take the test, and although the poison is usually 
administered in a weak decoction, still accidents have 
been known to happen. 

A plague of mice is also brought on by witchcraft. 
At Karonga, a man called Ndambasya, still living at 
Mfuru, on the Rukuru River, possesses this gift. His 
grandfather was put to death for the offence, but 
Ndambasya pursues his nefarious practices under the 


egis of the British Government, which is far too 
R 


258 Witchcraft 


intelligent to believe such nonsense. ‘The method is 
to take a male and a female mouse, cover them up in 
a pot with medicines, and when they have bred they 
are sent out into the gardens, where they multiply 
exceedingly. The British method of dealing with 
this plague is to pay so much for every dead mouse 
brought in; the Konde believe in getting at the 
sources of things, and as the source in this case 1s 
Ndambasya, he, if left to the tender mercies of his 
fellows, would die, There was a recrudescence of the 
plague in the year 1924, and I suspect Ndambasya 
did not feel too comfortable, for the patience of the 
people has a habit of coming to a sudden end at times. 

The methods by which witches and warlocks work 
their evil will are many. By the power of the evil eye 
they stop the milk of cattle, bring illness on children, 
and cause various kinds of misfortunes to come upon 
their enemies. One may kill a man by making a 
wax effigy, and letting it slowly melt betore the fire. 
He will die when the whole has been melted. Pneu- 
monia is brought on by making a small circlet of the 
leaves or roots from which various kinds of medicines 
are made, and sticking a wooden pin through it. A 
banana leaf pinned in four places will lead to the 
death of the victim, and the post mortem will reveal 
four internal wounds. Certain medicines put into a 
hole in the ground will turn a blood-red colour. 
Cover the hole carefully from sight, and in due time 
your man will cease to trouble you. A sure specific 
for causing the death of an enemy is made from hair 
clippings, nail parings, the spittle, earth gathered from 


Witchcraft 259 


the footprints of the victim, and the banana or other 
leaf on which he sat, mixed with medicines of various 
kinds. ‘The mixture is not administered to the victim. 
It is enough that it has been compounded. 

One more method of operating will be sufficient, 
though there are many others. he witch or wizard, 
stark-naked, goes, at night, after all are in bed, to the 
house of the person he wishes to injure, and there 
dances the dance called kuyinga, and then goes 
silently away. In the morning a child becomes sick, 
and shortly dies. Or, if it is not desired to be so un- 
forgiving, the harvest of the victim will be blighted. 
‘The wise householder, however, is not without defence. 
He secures himself and his family, and his gardens, 
from this kind of thing by placing medicine in the 
roof of his house, which roots to the spot the dancing 
wizard, who is found there in the morning, and dealt 
with. 

There is a very complete system of protection, 
which has been developed during the ages, guarding 
the person and the community against all kinds of 
evil, forming, as one writer has remarked, an insurance 
against accidents and evil powers. ‘The protection 
against witchcraft is especially complete. 

First, there is the risk of discovery by revelation, as 
in the dreams already referred to; or by experiment, 
as when the doctors apply their tests. But although 
the dreamer sometimes makes his discovery before any 
evil has been done, he perhaps as frequently fails ; 
and the doctor is never called in until the evil demands 
drastic treatment. 


260 Witchcraft 


Therefore it must be anticipated by the use of 
powerful medicines, which would probably be called 
charms in Europe; but as the Konde call them 
medicines, I prefer to use that term. ‘There is com- 
munal protection, and individual. For the former 
certain herbs are taken, burned into an ash, and mixed 
with oil. The mixture is put into two horns, one of 
which is placed in the rafters inside the chief’s house, 
and the other under the eaves outside, and behind. 
No one may approach the chief’s house from behind, 
for the medicines would destroy him. But, wheels 
within wheels, another drug is known which can 
destroy the efficacy of the drugs in the horn, and there- 
fore anyone seen approaching the house from behind 
would be suspected of trying to nullify the measures 
taken to ensure public safety. ‘To make this nullifying 
drug, the leaves of malimbalimba and undurusya are 
taken, and their extract added to what is in the horn, 
which thereupon loses its virtue, and the public are 
exposed to danger. 

To protect individual houses, the leaves of certain 
trees are taken, and laid on the fire, so that the smoke, 
spreading through the house, may ensure the safety 
of the inmates. ‘Then the same leaves, pounded and 
mixed with water, are sprinkled on the floor; and 
finally the root of another herb is buried under the 
doorstep, and will effectually prevent the entrance of 
witch or warlock. When a new house is being built, 
this same root is placed in various positions in the 
foundation, and the house is now protected from 
turret to foundation-stone, and the inmates dwell in 


Witchcraft 261 


security. As already said, no heathen house is without 
this protection. Gardens and cattle kraals are pro- 
tected in similar ways. 

But witchcraft spreads its nets far and wide, and it 
is not enough to protect the house, for a man may be 
attacked outside. ‘lo meet this menace, other measures 
must be taken. Each person drinks a decoction, and 
swallows a tiny white stone, found only in the Malila 
district. The effect of this is to enable him to see in 
dreams any dangers which threaten him personally 
from witchcraft; and to make assurance doubly sure, 
some persons wear charms on neck or wrist or ankle. 

No one knows when danger will come upon him. 
One who looks you steadily in the face is probably a 
wizard; why else should he look at you so? One 
who does not return your salutation, or returns it 
half-heartedly ; one who denies the reality of witch- 
craft ; one who is a notorious invader of the rights of 
husbands ; all such men (or women) are to be avoided, 
for they are all probably dangerous. 

And the reproach of witchcraft follows one after 
death. If the post mortem shows marks on the internal 
organs, the person has died of witchcraft ; but if the 
bowels are swollen or blackened, either to the right 
or to the left, the dead man was beyond doubt himself 
a wizard ; the swollen condition indicates clearly the 
presence of the two serpents which were the source of 
his secret powers. Any suspicion that was formerly 
entertained against him is now confirmed, and his 
heirs may find themselves involved in demands for 
reparation. 


262 Witchcraft. 


In 1922 a sorcerer got into the house of the chief 
Kaloso, near Mwaya. ‘The medicine which is always 
there brought him to a halt, and when Kaloso rose in 
the morning, he found him there in the form of an 
owl! Kaloso is one of the most intelligent chiefs I 
know ; but he sent out word, and his people came in 
great numbers to see with their own eyes the owl 
which was a sorcerer caught in the act. "The owl was 
not killed, for who knew what evil might be brought 
on the district if that were done? I suggested that it 
was an ordinary owl, which somehow had got into the 
house the previous evening. But ordinary owls, I 
was told, do not go into houses, while every one knows 
that wizards can be changed into owls by the medicine 
in the chief’s house. 

Sorcerers have naturally means of self-defence not 
available for common men. One wounded in a fight 
licks the wound and recovers; or if the wound is 
inaccessible to his lips, he takes the blood with his 
hand and swallows it, with the same result. One who 
has fallen sick of smallpox licks the pustules and 
recovers. 


CHAPTER XXI 


The Powers of Evil: II. Destructive 
Agencies 


HE attack upon Society, 1f one may so 

describe it, is not confined to the kind of 

witchcraft dealt with in the preceding 

chapter. More terrifying perhaps, and cer- 
tainly more dramatic, is the power which enables 
certain persons, also called Abalost (witches, wizards), 
to call up lions, crocodiles, and other agencies of death, 
and to direct their operations. When a crocodile 
secures a human victim, it leaves a part for its “‘ father,” 
the witch or wizard. A person killed by a crocodile, 
but rescued when too late, is not at once buried ; the 
body is watched to see if any token of attack by witch- 
craft can be detected. 

More important, however, 1s the umperangalamu, 
the lion-maker. Let it be again noted that, as in the 
cases of smallpox, a long death-roll of people killed by 
a lion is not the act of God; God does not do such 
things. It is the work of an evil agent, operating for 
hire, or to serve his own purposes. 

Sir Harry Johnston in his “ British Central Africa,” 
tells that when an attack was planned by the British 


forces upon a certain slave-raiding chief, a friend of 
263 


264 Destructive Agencies 


the latter, unable to send help in men, sent his son 
to raise all the lions and leopards in the country 
against the invaders. So confident were the people 
of the power of this man, that they did not even go 
out to fight until the British force was upon them ; 
and even then they made but a faint resistance, 
believing that the lions and leopards would ultimately 
come to their aid. 

At least three men who claim, or are believed to 
possess, this power, are alive to-day in or near the 
Konde country. At Deep Bay, Kayiparule is popu- 
larly supposed to have it, and at Fulirwa, not far off, 
Nkurunganga ; both of whom now disclaim know- 
ledge of the secret, though they boast that their 
fathers knew it. 

Kabeta of Musomba village, in the Isoko district, 
is perhaps the most famous of these men. In 1920 
he was hired by a man called Mwamswero to kill men, 
women, and children in the Nyondo district in 
Nyasaland. ‘he chief Nyondo was believed to have 
killed the brother of Mwamswero, and had paid only 
three cows instead of five to the family of the mur- 
dered man. The injured family, having no remedy 
against the chief, determined to call in other resources, 
and hence the employment of Kabeta. In the year 
indicated, a lion killed several people in seven different 
villages, all belonging to the chief Nyondo, and 
Kabeta demanded payment. Mwamswero offered 
him four cows, but the lion-maker demanded five, 
otherwise Mwamswero himself would be the next 
victim. In a public inquiry, Kabeta acknowledged 


Destructive Agencies 265 


having received the cattle, but admitted that he was 
deceiving the people. 

‘There is a medicine which protects those who have 
it against these lions. Kabeta himself, on the occa- 
sion referred to, gave medicine to the people of 
Chinunka, and to the son of Nyondo. ‘To Mwaka- 
palira of Chinunka he gave charms to put on his 
neck, and a rod to carry in his hand, with the assurance 
that these gave perfect protection to whoever carried 
them. One Sunday, Mwakapalira sent his two wives 
to the garden to get males: to make beer ; on the way 
they met some Christians, who told them that it was 
Sunday, and they should not do such work; but the 
women replied that God did not stop working on 
Sunday, and in any case they were adequately pro- 
tected. One of the women was killed within an hour 
by a lion, and belief in Kabeta’s charms against his 
own lions fell to zero. 

Individual protection, however, is not enough, and 
when such visitations threaten, the chief usually 
takes measures for the public safety. The following 
is the method practised by the chief Mwenemusuku : 
his doctor takes the heart and claws of a lion, which 
he boils together with the flesh of the dread flying- 
serpent imyifiwira ; the chief eats the heart of the 
lion, and is assured by the doctor that he is now 
himself a lion. The rest of the medicine is powdered 
and sent to all the headmen. ‘These send out men to 
‘‘ walk the marches,”’ bearing some of the medicine, 
and praying as they go: 

“Ye spirits, be gracious to us. This evil that is 
coming upon us, we know not whence it is. If it 


266 Destructive Agencies 


is the act of God, let it work, His house is great. 
But if it is the act of men, let it go where the sin is. 
I and mine have done nothing amiss.” 


As they go, they chew, for their own protection, the 
leaves of a shrub called munyekomaso, putting the 
chewed leaves into a small sack at the side. ‘The 
common people are warned to go in certain directions 
only for wood and water as long as the lion is known 
to be about. When it approaches a village, the local 
headman speaks : 


“You lion, if you have been sent out by men, 
follow where your prey leads you ; if you are from 
God, His house is great, go where you will.” 


Just how much effect this has on the lion, need not, 
perhaps, be too closely investigated. 

There are numerous stories, which, if they do 
nothing else, illustrate the naive faith of native 
Christians in the protecting care of God. A school 
inspector, going his rounds in 1920, when Kabeta’s 
lion was about, was offered the use of the protecting 
drugs, but refused. ‘‘God Himself,” he said, “is 
my protector.” In 1913 an evangelist was followed 
for some distance by a lion, and at last turned on the 
brute : 


“You lion,” he said, ‘‘ you have no master. I 


have a Master, Jesus Christ. I do not fear you. 
Do not follow me; get off in another direction ” ; 


which the lion, after roaring angrily, did! In the 
same year a lion was moving about on the lake shore, 


Destructive Agencies 267 


but the Christians, secure in their faith, refused to be 
kept from their gardens. No one, so far as [ heard, 
either Christian or heathen, was killed at that time. 
A Christian man, walking alone through the bush, was 
chased by an elephant. “ And God said, ‘ Look,’ and 
I looked, and behold a pit ; and I went down into it, 
and the elephant passed me by; and again God said 
‘Look,’ and I looked, and behold in the pit a very 
evil snake.” ‘There the written report ends; but as 
I had myself seen this man holding “‘a very evil 
snake ”’ alive in his hand, I have no reason to doubt 
that he acted with promptitude in the pit. 

The inguluka is a whitish snake, about four feet 
long, with a deadly bite. That it should exist at all 
is bad enough; but there are sorcerers who create it 
for their own purposes. Mwankosore, who lives about 
two miles from me, 1s believed to possess this power. 
He takes the roots of the pusz tree, which he puts into 
a pot along with a powerful medicine, and in a little 
time a snake emerges. ‘The secret of this medicine is 
known to a very few, and is guarded by word and by 
spell. ‘The intending purchaser must face a guard of 
other snakes sent out to kill him by the makers of the 
drug; should he, however, kill the snakes, he is 
acknowledged to be a great doctor, and a supply of 
the medicine is given to him, for which he pays a 
cow. 

When a sorcerer wishes to kill an enemy, he takes 
in his hand the snake he has created, and drops it at 
the house of his intended victim. It immediately 
makes for the doomed man, strikes, and returns with 


268 Destructive Agencies 


all speed to its “ father.” Should the victim have 
the good fortune to kill it, it will return to its original 
elements, and appear before him as a mere root of a 
tree. 

The next class of people who possess destructive 
powers are the poisoners. Direct evidence is naturally 
hard to get, for the poisoner must act in secret. ‘The 
poison need not be administered directly, though 
that is often done; if placed where the victim will 
touch it, it is enough; over the door, where it will 
drip on his head, or on the threshold, where he will 
touch it with his foot. Death will follow. In 1905 a 
man called Ulukamba had a quarrel with a neighbour, 
and sent his son to place medicine in the doorway of 
his enemy. ‘Two days later a son of the latter died 
suddenly. ‘The boy who placed the medicine gave 
away the secret, by telling some one, and Ulukamba 
was put to the poison test, which condemned him, 
and he was ordered to pay over two cows. He refused, 
threatened to inform the magistrate that the chief 
had consented to the poison ordeal, and the case had 
to be dropped. But the belief that he killed the boy 
is still firmly held by all the people of his village. 
‘There was no case against the boy who placed the 
medicine, as he was obeying orders issued by his 
father. 

The destructive power of anger is firmly believed 
in by the Konde. ‘To speak the name of a brother in 
anger, is strictly forbidden, for it may lead to his 
death. ‘The process is rationalized thus: the spirits 
hear the words of anger, and, assuming that there is 


Destructive Agencies 269 


good reason for it, send a disease, or engineer an 
accident, which kills the person named. A _ well- 
known doctor, named Mwenekasangamara, now dead, 
was credited with wider powers. If he spoke in anger 
the name of any person within his family, and that 
was a very wide circle, that person would die. But 
he had the privilege of withdrawing, and so neutral- 
izing the effect of his anger. The underlying idea is 
that it is contrary to God’s law to speak evil of 
dignities ; if the person spoken against, like Mwene- 
kasangamara, heard of it, his anger would be aroused, 
and the spirits would come to his support. 

A daughter who despised her father, might be 
punished with barrenness if her father so desired. 
Mwenekasangamara imposed this punishment on a 
married daughter, and the curse was not removed 
until she had made proper atonement, and soon 
afterwards her infirmity was corrected. Another 
well-known case is that of a man called Songwe, living 
at Lupembe, whose daughter aroused his wrath to 
such a degree that he called upon his ancestors to 
destroy her. She became ill the same day, and died 
the next. This was in December, 1912. In the light 
of modern psychological beliefs, there is nothing 
impossible in the story. 


CHAPTER Pxoctl 
Sickness & Medicine 


HE Konde possess a surprisingly wide know- 

ledge of the uses of herbs. I have in my 

possession a collection of over a hundred 

specimens of leaves and roots, brought to 
me by the doctors who used them, and who described © 
to me the disease for which each was a cure, and the 
manner of applying the drug. Knowledge of these 
plants is handed down from generation to generation. 
In a prayer to be given presently, the doctor pleads 
that he has not departed from the knowledge of his 
ancestors, as a reason why he should be assisted now ; 
an attitude which is not, perhaps, a guarantee of 
progress, but certainly is a guarantee of honesty. The 
knowledge is quite real so far as it goes. I was myself 
in 1912 cured instantaneously of a raging toothache 
by an old native doctor, and two years passed before 
the trouble returned. ‘The old man boiled in water 
some rootlets of a tree which grows in the neighbour- 
hood, and the liquid, when cool, was applied to the 
tooth with a leaf, when the pain vanished as by magic. 
A few years later another doctor undertook to cure 
me of a severe attack of neuritis, but I preferred the 


attentions of a European doctor ; a decision which I 
270 


Sickness & Medicine 271 


have often regretted, not because the European did 
not cure me, but because I missed an opportunity of 
testing the native. 

A European well known in the country told me 
recently that in 1901 he was cured of black-water 
fever by a native doctor on the Zambesi. Water 
boiled with roasted rice was given him in large 
quantities, and a small sack, filled with boiled leaves 
of a tree not known to me, was bound around the 
abdomen. His recovery was rapid, and he has himself 
successfully used the same cure in other cases. Another 
European was cured of persistent dysentery by an old 
native doctor. 

Doubtless there is much pretence; drugs are ad- 
ministered without real knowledge ; but in the main 
the doctors are honourable men, fulfilling an important 
place in the life of the community, relieving much pain, 
and achieving striking successes, which are too well 
authenticated to admit of doubt. ‘That in many 
cases they ruin the patient for life, is unfortunately 
also only too true. But however that may be, they 
have not forfeited the confidence of the people. ‘The 
advent of the scientifically trained European doctor 
has diminished indeed, but by no means destroyed, 
the influence of his African confrére in science. 
Hundreds still consult the native doctor, many in 
preference to, and not a few after having tried, the 
white man’s medicine. A medical friend of mine tells 
a good story against himself. He was asked by one of 
his own employees for the loan of two shillings; but 
the applicant was most unwilling to tell what the 


are Sickness & Medicine 


money was to be used for. It came out, however, 
that it was to pay a native doctor, to whom he was 
taking his wife for consultation! ‘The native’s fee 
was two shillings. The fee at the dispensary would 
not have been one-tenth of that sum, but the patient 
preferred the high fee and the unqualified adviser. 
Nor is this surprising, when it is remembered that so 
much of the troubles which afflict the native, are 
believed to be due to the interference of spirits, with 
which the European doctor will have nothing to do ; 
while the Konde doctor will consult them as part at 
least, if not the whole, of his diagnosis. Hence the 
confidence in him. He is in touch with the sources 
of the trouble. 

And this same conviction, that the native doctors 
are in touch with the sources of the trouble, leads to 
some of the most foolish beliefs of the common 
people, and of the most mischievous practices of the 
doctors. It is the source of the absurd confidence in 
the power of medicine to turn bullets into water, for 
example. In 1897 medicine was prepared which 
would cause the white man, in what was then the 
Neu Langenburg area, to disappear. It is believed 
by many natives with whom I have been in touch, 
that some doctors are seeking for a ‘‘ formula ” to-day, 
which will succeed where the previous one so obviously 
failed ; suggestive of a state of mind similar perhaps 
to that of our own alchemists of centuries ago; but 
suggestive also of a desire, at least in some quarters, 
to see the last of the white man. 

Both the gathering of herbs, and the administration 


ad 





A PROHIBITIONIST. 


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Sickness & Medicine 273 


of the medicine, is a religious act. Mwenekasanga- 
mara, the doctor referred to in the previous chapter, 
used the following prayer, when gathering herbs; it 
was given to me by his son, who got it from his 
father. And Mwenekasangamara claimed that it had 
descended through many generations in his family. 


“* Be merciful to me, thou Creator. The medicine 
which I am seeking is the same that my fathers 
sought, and it was Thou that didst open their eyes. 
Show me the roots, and I shall know them. But if 
my patient is not to recover, hide them from me, 


and I shall know that it is Thy will.” 


The following, used when medicine is being adminis- 
tered in a case of ulcer that has resisted treatment, 
is rather a statement than a prayer : 


“‘ If this disease has come from God, medicine 
will heal it ; for God, who made us, made also the 
trees, and gave us intelligence to know their pro- 


perties, But if it has come from men, I cannot 
heal it.” 


The last sentence means that witchcraft or the anger 
of a spirit is at the root of the trouble, and steps 
must be taken to discover the facts. Then, but only 
then, the ulcer will yield to treatment. 

But behind both the prayer and the medicine, or 
at any rate in addition to them, there is something 
else. ‘There are certain medicines which are never 
administered to patients; their function is to give 


power to the doctor himself; administered to a 
S 


pips Sickness & Medicine 


patient, they would almost certainly kill him, for it is 
very probable that a patient who believed that he had 
taken one of these by mistake or otherwise, would die 
of sheer fright. 

The inyifwira is a fiery flying-serpent, which lives 
in pools, and turns the waters red ; climbs trees, 
which thereupon break out into flame, but are not 
consumed ; chases its prey for five miles, and lucky 
is he whose heels are light enough to escape; and 
finally, when dead, its body is made into the most 
powerful drug in the Konde Pharmacopeeia. It gives 
authority to chiefs, and skill to doctors and diviners, 
and the common man who obtains possession of a tiny 
quantity is assured of success and riches. To tell the 
ordinary heathen Konde that all this is fable, is like 
telling very good and not necessarily unintelligent 
persons of a few generations ago, that there was no 
devil, with horns and hoofs and a tail! 

Only the biggest doctors undertake to kill this 
monster when a fresh supply is called for. And even 
they, before beginning, protect themselves and their 
assistants with a great variety of other drugs, not so 
dangerous to obtain. ‘The creature having been 
located in some pool or other, a small hut is built at 
a great distance, into which in the past a slave was put, 
to-day a sheep or a goat. The hut is now clayed over, 
and closed on all sides, the clay being thickly planted 
with sharp knives, and the whole sprinkled plentifully 
with a powdered food, of which the snake is very fond. 
All being ready, a swift runner is sent to the pool, a 
bell in his hand, the ringing of which attracts the 


- Sickness & Medicine 275 


snake. It emerges from the pool, with a hu hu sound, 
and the runner flies for his life towards the hut, 
pursued by the snake. Attracted by the sprinkled 
food, it climbs all over the hut, and is cut to pieces 
on the knives. After a little, and usually at night, 
the doctor in charge goes out to reconnoitre, and, 
finding the dead body, sends to tell all the surround- 
ing chiefs and big doctors ; who come, protected by 
a powerful prophylactic, for even the dead inyifwira 
can kill the unprotected. Each chief gets a portion of 
the flesh, a large share going to Chungu, who in turn 
distributes it to his leading subordinates and doctors, 
The blood is collected and sold, a small portion for a 
cow, to smaller men, who have no natural right to it. 

The dread in which this medicine (ifingira it is 
now called) is held by the common people, is extra- 
ordinary. At Karonga in 1923 a man was accused of 
attempting to poison another. On his person was 
found a small packet done up in bark-cloth, which no 
native in the court would touch; and when the 
magistrate took it into his hands and proceeded to 
open it, the court was cleared in an instant. Whether 
it was the medicine made from the imyifwira snake, 
I do not know ; but it undoubtedly belonged to that 
class of medicines. 

Illnesses may be due to natural causes, which the 
native calls God. They yield to treatment without 
any ceremony. ‘The prayer already quoted indicates 
the Konde attitude to such diseases. Secondly, ill- 
ness may be due to witchcraft, and then there is no 
hope of cure until the sorcerer has been outwitted by 


276 Sickness &* Medicine 


the use of both drugs and ceremonies. Next, the 
action of the spirits brings on diseases, and until the 
cause of their anger has been dealt with, no doctor 
will undertake to cure the patient. Wounds or 
injuries in battle, by falling trees, by attack of animals, 
or by any other means, may be due to any of the above 
causes. 

The doctor may be a man or a woman. ‘Fhe tee 
varies from about a farthing to a sixty shilling cow, 
and the manner of payment varies also. In some 
cases payment precedes treatment ; in others, it 
follows ; and in still others the degree of cure effected 
decides the amount to be paid. 

In what follows, no attempt is made at scientific 
classification ; rather a rough grouping of symptoms 
euides the sequence of items. Medicines are usually 
administered in beer or in milk, hot or cold, according 
to the disease which is being treated. And the place 
where the decoction is drunk is very important ; in 
snake bite, for instance, it is fatal for the patient to 
go inside the house before the medicine has been 
taken which it is hoped will save his life. A native 
Christian was, in 1913, suspended from ordinances 
for drinking medicine while seated on a banana stem 
at a place where two paths met. 

Mental troubles of various kinds are treated, and 
not, I am assured, without success in some cases. 
Maya is grief, due to any cause. It is treated by giving 
an infusion of a plant called sabe, not unlike parsley 
in appearance. The result is great cheerfulness in the 
patient, due, no doubt, to exhilarating qualities in 


Sickness & Medicine 227 


the plant. Ipingu is sadness, or anger. The parents 
or relatives of an absent friend, having no news of him 
for some time, give way to grief or anger, and the 
emotion causes illness in the absent one. The latter 
goes to the diviner to learn why he is ill, and is told. 
The leaves of a plant called imyekenyeke are pounded 
and boiled in water, and the infusion drunk, the 
patient saying in the presence of the doctor : 


“Let the words of those people fall back upon 
them. I have spoken no evil; I am not a hard 
man. God and the spirits behold me. May I get 
sleep.” 


Minyenya is nightmare. The actual meaning of 
the word is ancestors, and the bad dreams are due to 
their action. It is cured by an infusion of the plant 
kateteya, taken while repeating the incantation: ‘‘ We 
drive you away, you who trouble us. Leave our friend 
that he may sleep.” Amahelu is disobedience to 
parents or relatives. ‘lake the fruit of imbangala and 
munyu, and add the flesh of the fish ingumba ; reduce 
to a powder, and mix with beer in a small calabash. 
This the disobedient one is forced to drink three or 
four times, nothing being left in the calabash. I have 
no doubt at all that most children find obedience less 
obnoxious than the mixture. Similar success attends 
the use of a drug made from the mulombwa tree. The 
kasoka 18 a tiny creature which covers itself with 
scraps of grass, and moves by using its head as a lever. 
It is a sovereign remedy, when mixed with other drugs, 
for madness, as well as for that form of madness which 


278 Sickness & Medicine 


makes a woman unfaithful to her husband. For 
impulamutu, a brain trouble which makes the sufferer 
strike his head against trees or other hard objects, 
there is a cure, but I have not discovered what it is. 
For dizziness, an infusion is made from the roots of 
the kalemerera plant, and the patient first drinks, 
then washes his face with, the infusion. Epilepsy is 
treated with a mixture made from the roots and leaves 
of many plants. The mouth is forced open if neces- 
sary when the drink is being administered. Natives 
assert that cures are effected, but I know of no cases 
that have been cured. 

There is no disease more common among the 
Bantu peoples than ulcers, sores, abscesses. The 
common sironda is treated with a wash made from the 
infusion of pounded burungo leaves. If it does not 
yield to treatment, it is due to witchcraft or spirits, 
and in either case the necessary preliminaries must be 
gone through. A special form of this disease is found 
when the ulcers break out on the breast or in the 
mouth. ‘The diseased part is washed with an infusion 
of indobo bark, and another infusion is taken internally 
twice a day for a few days. A more malignant form 
is called ndoroka, for which the leaves of the plant 
kanga are infused, and applied as for kironda, with the 
same ceremonies, if a cure is not effected within a 
reasonable time. Mpenga is a slightly different form 
of ndoroka. Kabimba is something of the nature of 
an inside tumour which must be let out. Roots of 
the tubimba shrub are reduced to a dry powder, 
spread on the leaf of the untugutu tree, and bound to 


Sickness & Medicine 279 


the place with a cord made from fibre of kabumbu ; 
in about ten minutes the swelling will burst and the 
matter escape. The same results follow from binding 
the place with cord made from wumguluka shrub. 
Gourds are often used instead of leaves, and are tied 
on with cords passing through holes bored in the 
sides of the gourd. For syphilis (kasendz) the roots 
of the indabi shrub are infused and drunk, and a 
powder made from indobo shrub is rubbed into the 
wounds or sores. 

Kitasya is intussusception of the bowels, found 
mostly in children, and usually fatal. When one child 
after another in a family dies, an examination is made 
of the bowels, bamboo knives being used for the 
operation. If kitasya is indicated, the parents drink 
an infusion made from the leaves of a creeper called 
inguluka, which is taken with beer. Then the bed is 
turned so that the head is where the feet were. he 
woman wears on her neck, tied up in a piece of bark, 
a section of the plant from which the infusion is made. 
But in giving this medicine, as in many others, the 
doctor will say, “This medicine is not mine; it is 
God’s ; He must work in you.” When another child 
is born, the doctor is called to give it medicine, and 
to shave its head. The fee isa cow; anda hoe is paid 
when the child reaches the age of three. 

For other internal conditions, a mere enumeration 
must suffice. Internal pains, dysentery, diarrhcea, 
constipation, worms, vomiting, indigestion, and was- 
ting diseases are all treated in similar fashion, each 
having its own specific drug or mixture of drugs. 


280 Sickness & Medicae 


Fever, if due to natural causes, is treated with the 
infusion of the leaves of amafumbo ; if due to the 
action of the spirits, a prayer for mercy is added. 
Sekema is malaria with headache. ‘The patient must 
sit in the open, where he can see the sun, and drink 
from a closely woven basket an infusion of lusisigembe ; 
and in some cases the extracted juice of moromoro is 
put into one ear. There is a “ general sickness ” called 
bukanye, due to witchcraft. ‘To neutralize the witch- 
craft, the whole body is washed with an infusion of 
ulukanganunya, and a drink is given made from the 
leaves of the mungwina tree. Severe burning is gener- 
ally believed to be the work of the spirits if it occurs 
at night, and it is at night that most burns occur. 
The native is a heavy sleeper, and he lies with his 
feet stretched out towards the fire. A brand falls 
upon a foot, and he is burned before he has properly 
awakened ; but it was the work of the spirits, who 
have now to be placated with cloth, or a goat, or a 
fowl. ‘Then the burned parts are smeared with the 
honey of a small insect called wmunya, and washed 
with the infusion of the leaves of the kasambanya 
shrub. Scalding is treated with castor oil. 

Muscular pains like zkiraso and ilyuru, which are 
probably pneumonia and rheumatism, are treated 
first as due to natural causes, and if this fails, witch- 
craft is assumed to be the cause, and steps taken 
accordingly. Prayer is offered, if the following can 
be called prayer : 

“You kiraso, if you have come from God, the 
medicine will cure you. If you have been sent by 


Sickness & Medicine 281 


men, are not they also flesh? ‘They fail, they die ; 
but first they kill us. Let this disease fly away 


from me.”’ 


An infusion of the roots of imdobo tree already men- 
tioned, is now given to the patient. 


Diseases of the eyes, ears, teeth, gums are also 
treated. A list would be tedious, and a detailed state- 


ment there is no space for. Enough to say that a 
person qualified for the task could write a good-sized 
book on the subject of native medicine. There are, 
however, still some diseases and practices of which 
some brief account must be given. 

Snake bite. Naturally in a land where snakes are 
numerous, antidotes are in use, and are claimed to be 
successful. [he roots of kisongora infused and drunk, 
are said to be a sure remedy, if takenintime. A rich 
man, however, would not be advised to take this 
alone, for his riches bring him under suspicion of 
being a sorcerer, and the snake may have bitten him 
by command of his jealous fellow-sorcerers. ‘T’o over- 
come this an incantation must be used. 


“May you be defeated! The goods I have, I 
stole from no man. ‘They are my own. ‘This 1s 
true, as God sees me.” 


Another remedy is the root of kitwmbo, the infusion 
mixed with soot from the inside of the house. The 
mixture must be drunk outside, for if the patient goes 
in he will die. A method favoured by other doctors 1s 
to hold the part bitten over a fire to which has been 
added the leaves of the unkwesi,a large tree. Presently 


282 Sickness & Meditane 


the fang will drop out, and the man will be saved ! 
There are men living near me who claim to have seen 
this being done. 

The birth of children is accompanied by loving 
care, gross superstition, and much medical treatment, 
useful or otherwise. All women at that time are 
given a drink of indobo leaves, pounded and mixed 
with water. If the placenta has not come away 
satisfactorily, castor oil is given. And if pain super- 
venes, the bark of indobo is again given, pounded 
and mixed with water. For a child weak at birth, 
roots of unsuba and mungwina are taken, pounded, 
mixed with water, and the child is washed in the 
mixture. Sterility in man or woman can be removed 
by the right drugs ; and when a woman is getting on 
in years and wishes no more children, a mixture is in 
use which will have the desired effect. Medicines 
for producing abortion are widely known, and 
frequently used, as also are love potions. 

Steaming is resorted to in cases of great pain or 
weakness. Water is cooked in a large pot, with the 
bark of mparampara added. When the pot has boiled, 
it is taken off the fire, and the patient, covered with a 
mat, kneels over it, supported if very weak, for about 
ten minutes. Massaging also is employed when one is 
very tired, the leaves of muyoka being pounded to 
give a juice for lubrication, or, as the people them- 
selves say, to get into the body through the pores. 
Cupping is employed for headache and rheumatic 
pains. Eight cuts are made in two lines, on each side 
of the head; a small horn is put over the cuts; a 


Sickness & Medicine 283 


vacuum is created by suction, and the hole in the horn 
closed with beeswax. In about a quarter of an hour 
the cup is removed. Pain in the eyes, legs, back, is 
so treated. 

Smallpox, the most dreaded of all scourges, has 
already been dealt with under ‘“‘ Worship” and 
“ Witchcraft,” and all that is here necessary is to indi- 
cate what is done for the cure of patients. An infusion 
made from the roots of ikanganunya and sambwe is 
given to drink, and the body is washed with the same 
mixture. ‘The pustules are opened with the thorns 
of unsuba. But more important than the medicine 
is a clear conscience in the patient; and prayer to 
the spirits and confession of sins must be made before 
the medicine is administered. The father, in the 
presence of all the family, says: “‘ My son has small- 
pox ; let us be at peace ; whoever has anything against 
him, let him declare it.’ Any matters against the 
sick man are now inquired into. It may be a debt, 
or a quarrel, or a charge of impudence in the case 
of a boy. The sick man is also questioned, and makes 
his confession, usually of misconduct with girls, who 
are forbidden to approach the house. If married 
women are involved, neither they nor their husbands 
may come near. A prayer for the removal of the 
disease is now offered by the family representative, at 
the door of the house in which the patient lies, and the 
prayer is accompanied by the usual squirting of water 
from the mouth, which is never omitted. The medi- 
cine may now be administered to the sick man. A 
prophylactic is used by all the other members of the 


284 Sickness @ Medicine 


family who have not had smallpox, but it is evidently 
not greatly trusted, for it is used with the formula, 
‘Protection against smallpox is unknown, but let us 
try. If God and the spirits agree we shall be safe.” 
After this ceremony there must be no quarrelling, 
Peace in the village is a condition of immunity from 
the disease. 

In a considerable number of cases incisions are 
made in the skin, and powdered medicine rubbed in. 
This 1s done for general pains, rheumatism, backache, 
elephantiasis, toothache, spleen. For toothache, if 
the pain is in the right side of the face, incisions are 
made between the great and second toes of the left 
foot, and the powder rubbed in ; if the pain is in the 
left, the powder goes in the same way into the right 
foot. 

Post mortems are still conducted in all cases where 
there is any doubt as to the cause of death. Until 
quite recently no one was buried without examination, 
and in some districts that is still the case. The 
operation is performed at the graveside by the friends 
of the dead man, the actual operator being as a rule 
a near relative. Ifa black substance is found in the 
gall-bladder, a diviner is consulted, to find out who 
brought on the disease. If the examination of the 
gall-bladder yields no result, the heart is examined. 
Ulcers on that organ indicate witchcraft as the cause 
of death; fat indicates leprosy. Next, the intestines 
are examined ; if majira (pus) is found there it indi- 
cates a kind of rheumatism accompanied with boils. 
The examination being over, the parts removed are 


Sickness & Medicine 285 


restored to their places, and the body is buried ; and 
all who had any part in the operation drink medicine 
to protect them from the disease from which the 
man died. 

For wounds in battle an infusion of the roots of 
kamemena is given to cause vomiting, in case there is 
blood in the stomach. The wounds are washed with 
an infusion of impigi roots, and bound with leaves of 


untugutu, fresh dressings being applied every day until 
the wounds are healed. 


CHAPTER XXIII 
Wonder Medicine 


OT that the Konde wonders; he wonders 

at the achievements of the European; 

but his own far greater marvels do not 

rouse his curiosity. They are part of the 
order of Nature, and no more matter for surprise than 
the effects of medicine administered directly to a 
patient. Through long generations they have known 
men who had power to stop the rain, or to cause the 
wind to blow, or to do other things which common ~ 
men cannot do. Where is the difficulty in believing 
these things? Is it true that the white man does not 
even believe what he sees taking place before his 
eyes? “‘ Imbulukutu yo syola,” the ear is a deceiver, 
indeed, but you must either believe what you see 
before you, or give up all pretence of sanity. Coinci- 
dence? It is just as easy to say God, and a great deal 
more sensible ; for it is God who gives to each man his 
powers ; to one, power to cause the wind to blow; 
to another, power to bring lions and leopards; to 
another, power of witchcraft, and soon. In every case 
medicine is used, but, to repeat what was said in the 
preceding chapter, ‘God, who made man, made also the 
trees,and gave us intelligence to know their properties.” 


One of my native friends, when on a journey, 
286 


Wonder Medicine 287 


chews, as he goes, a certain root; and he fears no 
wild animal, for none will come near him. ‘The secret 
has been in his father’s family for generations, and 
not one of them was ever killed by a wild animal. 
Another incises powdered medicine into his wrists 
and ankles, and he is absolutely free from danger of 
snakes. Nor has it ever been heard of that a man 
wearing certain charms on his ankles while crossing 
a river, has been taken by a crocodile. Men have been 
taken by crocodiles from time to time, but they were 
either too poor to buy this charm, or too foolish to 
wear it. It is all law, though the Konde knows nothing 
about what we call law. Get the right medicine, and 
the desired result is sure: that is law. Perform the 
correct ceremonies, and what you ask for will come, 
as sure as water will come through an open pipe: 
that also is law. But it does not follow that the 
native will accept anything that is offered him as a 
charm. He must know who made it, where the maker 
got his knowledge, what is his ancestry. Any proof 
will not do. It must be proof that will satisfy the 
Konde ; and that is by no means what would satisfy 
a white man. But the obstinacy with which the white 
man refuses to believe in things that to the African 
are so obvious as hardly to call for explanation, is 
part of the reason why still the latter has doubts as 
to the perfect sanity of the European. One who does 
not comprehend the obvious is mentally below par. 

In preceding chapters native beliefs and practices 
in regard to various illnesses, agriculture, war, lions, 
hunting and fishing, have been indicated. 


288 Wonder Medicine 


One of the commonest charms is called isigita, and 
is worn on neck, wrist, or ankle, as a protection against 
snakes, crocodiles, lions, or leopards. It guards also 
against sore eyes, ulcers, evil spirits. This powerful 
charm, the description of which reads like a patent 
medicine advertisement, is made as follows: take dry 
pupwe or mphiyi roots, reduce to powder, add pow- 
dered head of kitumbi snake, and a piece of mphiyt1 
root ; set the whole to boil on the fire in a broken 
pot. Then cut the roots into four pieces, string them 
on cords, leave two such cords in the house, and carry 
another wherever you go. If bitten by a snake, chew 
quickly at the charm, and then bind it on the wound. 

When crossing a river, this charm, strung as before, 
is tied to the legs, the four pieces in this case hanging 
at about three inches from each other. Numerous 
other charms are used for the same purpose, but the 
one I have described is the favourite. 

Children suffering from mumps take small bundles 
of firewood, and lay them at the cross-roads, where 
the first passer-by will pick up the disease, and the 
children will immediately recover. 

A youth who finds himself unpopular with maidens, 
goes to the doctor, who incises a powder between the 
eyes in the forehead. His unpopularity will assuredly ~ 
pass away, as will that of a girl similarly treated. An 
older man who is disliked or distrusted by his fellows, 
has a different medicine incised into the same place, 
and with equal success. But, more valuable still, a 
man who is involved in a lawsuit, before either the 
magistrate or the local chief, or who wishes to gain 


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Wonder Medicine 289 


the favour of the white man for any reason, can be 
supplied with a charm which will secure the end he 
has in view. For a few moments after the interview 
begins, he chews at the charm, then removes it from 
his mouth, trusting for the rest to what has been 
incised in his forehead. A favourable result may be 
confidently expected. 

Thieving charms are also in use, and men who 
operate under such protection are called balebi. A 
drug unknown to me is tied up in a leaf, and thrown 
on to the roof of the house to be robbed, and also at 
the door, to make the inmates sleep. ‘The thieves 
enter, either by opening the now facile door, or by 
digging ; and immediately place another drug under 
the heads of the sleeping owners of the house. ‘“ May 
they sleep heavily ; may they dream dreams,” is their 
incantation. Another medicine is worn on the wrists. 
So bold are the robbers thus protected that, when they 
have removed everything they wish, they awaken the 
sleepers, and demand food (which is given to them), 
without fear of being recognized ; but it is not per- 
haps surprising, considering the fear in which these 
criminals are held, that the victims never admit that 
they recognize the thieves. 

The house, however, may be protected. Powdered 
root of tkitebo is spread all over the house, and any 
thief who enters will have sores breaking out on his 
lips, a thing which happens only to thieves who have 
ignored this charm. 

Kondeland should be a paradise for debtors, for the 


man who knows the ropes can arrange to put off pay- 
. | 


290 Wonder Medicine 


ment so often that finally it is either not paid at all, 
or paid when it is quite convenient for the debtor to 
do so. ‘To secure this desirable result the debtor, 
when he learns that his creditor is coming to demand 
payment, slips out into the bush, where he gets the 
roots of a plant called bwtisi, which he chews as the 
creditor approaches. A most amiable conversation 
ensues, at the end of which the creditor begs his 
friend on no account to disturb himself about the 
small matter that lies between them: any other time 
will do just as well, and he will be delighted to call 
again in a couple of months or so. The same end is 
attained by incising a powder into the forehead 
between the eyes. 

Hunting medicines have already been referred to. 
One is incised along the bone from the thumb to the 
elbow ; another is taken internally, but this latter 1s 
dangerous, because it leads to a lingering death. When 
death draws on, instead of dying as common men do, 
the whole body of the hunter who drinks this medicine 
becomes helpless ; the heart keeps going, the lips move 
and talk; death does not come. Then his friends 
come and sing to him: “‘ Ndembo syaya mmiyombo,” 
the elephants are among the trees. ‘The sick man, 
puffing out his cheeks, emits breath with a whirring 
sound, which is supposed to resemble a sound made 
by elephants, and presently he breathes his last. 

But there are few ills, imaginary or otherwise, for 
which there are no cures, imaginary or otherwise: 
and the cautious hunter, finding old age creeping on 
him, and his hunting days becoming a thing of 


Wonder Medicine 291 


memories and yarns, eats food made from the flour 
of a pumpkin, which destroys the virtues of his hunt- 
ing medicines, and at the same time takes away all 
probability of his death being the prolonged weari- 
ness it would otherwise be. 

Fishing nets are drugged to ensure a good catch; 

but here again caution must be exercised, for a very 
great catch is an omen of a very large family, which 
is not always an ambition held by the Konde people. 
_ The mother who has just given birth to a child 
must not cook food, nor may she warm herself at the 
common fire; a small fire is kindled for her at which 
she sits by herself; and when the child goes out of 
the house for the first time a medicine is put into its 
mouth to guard it against the ills of the world into 
which it has come. 

Christians do none of these things; but Christians 
are not as other people. ‘They have passed away from 
the fear of spirits and from the dread of a world in 
which anything may happen at any moment; and 
the fact that they escape the consequences of failure 
to follow custom is having its effect on the common 
people, many of whom are cautiously experimenting 
to see whether they too may live a freer and more 
unshadowed life; but the belief in the protective 
powers of such things as I have been describing dies 


hard. 


CHAPTER XXIV 
Death & Burial 


MONG the Konde, as among other Bantu 
peoples, no man dies “ unwept, unhonoured, 
or unsung.” However contemptible he may 
have been in life, he has now passed to a 

sphere in which he is clothed with fresh powers, which, 
for good or ill, he can direct upon his living de- 
scendants, who take care to give no cause of offence. 
He cannot, however, punish them for any evil they 
may have done him while alive ; only post mortem sins 
can be visited upon them: neglect of ceremonies, 
refusal of beer at the funeral, omission of his name 
when prayer is made, and other tokens of forgetiul- 
ness. And the power for harm of each spirit is limited 
to his own descendants; but chiefs, naturally, can 
bring misfortune upon the whole of the community 
over which they ruled in life. 

Immediately a man has died, his eldest child, son 
or daughter, unless an infant, begins the mourning. 

‘Alas, my father, I too have met trouble!” ‘Then 
the women, “‘Ah! trouble comes to you as to others.” 
Next the leader, “‘ My father, my lion, my leopard,” 
naming all the strong and fierce animals to which the 
dead man is compared ; the women say, “ Now indeed 


you are poor” ; and the boy replies, “ Yes, my 
292 


Death & Burial 293 


mothers, my strength is gone, my hope is broken. 
How poor am I among men!” If he is a boy he is 
now taken by a kindly relative and put outside, and 
told not to weep like a woman. During all this time, 
and perhaps for three days to come, the drum is 
beating; a slow tum tum at first, but rising later to 
a more furious noise, which goes on night and day 
until the mourning is over. 

The women now take up the tale, and one goes 
over all the virtues of the dead, a long wail from the 
others following upon each statement. Day by day 
this goes on, as new parties come to the mourning. 
The women smear their bodies and their faces with 
clay, and wear bands of banana fibre or of palm leaf 
on ankles, wrists, and forehead. ‘The men, at the death 
of an important person, carry spear and shield. 

In the meantime some relatives have gone to dig 
the grave, and others are dressing the dead man for 
burial. ‘The body is washed, a man’s body by men, 
and woman’s by women, and dressed in manyeta 
(body rings), anklets, wristlets, and finally swathed in 
as much cloth as his relatives can afford to buy, only 
the eyes being left uncovered. Before the dressing, 
however, the body is oiled, and if the dead man was 
a warrior, his 1sambanjuni (feather head-dress) is placed 
on his head. 

The women now take up the body, and carry it 
through the village, wailing as they go. Having shown 
the dead man for the last time around the familiar 
haunts of his life, they lay him down near the grave, 
where mats are spread to receive him. Now the post 


294 Death & Burial 


mortem takes place, though in the neighbourhood of 
Missions and Magistracies the practice is beginning 
to die out. Only the operators are present, and when 
it is over the others approach again. ‘The brothers or 
near relatives of the dead man go down into the grave 
and receive the body from other relatives who hand 
it tothem. It is not placed in the bottom of the grave, 
but.in a cavity dug into the side, the entrance to 
which is closed with a bamboo door, before the soil 1s 
filled in. The body faces towards the original home 
ofthe dead. Ifthe dead man possessed cattle, a curious 
ceremony now takes place. A cow is brought, and 
made to look into the grave where her late owner lies, 
her head being forcibly bent if necessary. The cow 
is now the property of the spirits, and must never be 
given away or sold out of the family. Little children 
of the dead man are handed across the grave, and 
older children leap over it, and then pull themselves, 
in a sitting position, over the soil which is presently 
to be filledin. If this ceremony is properly performed, 
the dead parent will not disturb the children by 
nightmares. Its omission is an insult to the dead ; 
but the practice is being abandoned by the more 
progressive sections of the community. It is at this 
point that the parting address, given in the chapter 
on “ The Spirits,” is spoken. When the soil is filled in, 
a cutting of indola tree is placed at head and foot, to 
mark the grave. 

All who took any part in the burying must now 
wash in running water, which carries off the pollu- 
tion; and carries off also the danger of the disease 


Death & Burial 295 


which killed the-man passing over to those present 
at the funeral. Those who performed the post mortem 
take medicine as well. The funeral ox or cow 1s now 
killed, and the flesh divided among the various groups. 
The next stage is to “‘ disinherit ” the dead man, to 
cut him off from all connection with earthly matters. 
His mats were buried with him ; now his bananas are 
cut down, his hoes are taken to the grave and the hafts 
broken, while all baskets and pots are destroyed and 
left to rot there. His cattle go to his heirs, and his 
wives build themselves huts in which they live for a 
year, “covering the footsteps of the dead man” ; 
after which they also go to the heirs. (Much of this 
is now falling into disuse, especially around Karonga.) 
The dead man has been dissociated from the living : 
the bananas grow again, but they are not his; his 
house may be occupied, but he has only the rights of 
a ghost in it; and in many places the house is left to 
decay as soon as the funeral is over, and the wives 
have built themselves huts not far off. But the belief 
also prevails, side by side with the desire to cut off 
the dead man from the living, that by destroying his 
goods they go with him to the land of spirits. 

The Konde have a strange belief, that a dead body 
casts no shadow ; if it does, it is a sign that the spirit 
still lingers around, and if he is not driven off, another 
member of the family will die soon. ‘The most 
effective way of despatching him to his proper abode 
is to burn his body. If the diviner finds that a second 

- death in the family is due to the reluctance of the 
first to go to his fathers, the body is dug up, and 


296 Death & Burial 


medicine placed in the empty grave, which attracts 
the lizard into which the soul of the dead man has 
entered. It is thus caught and burned in the grave. 
The parents or near relatives drink medicine, and the 
body is carried off by the doctor to be burned in the 
bush. Among the Bandali, all bodies are dug up 
after the flesh has rotted away, and the bones are 
taken into the forest, where they are placed in a sitting 
position against a tree and left there. A much more 
gruesome custom, which prevails among the Bandali, 
is that of keeping the bones on the verandah of the 
heir’s house, done up in banana leaves, which are 
renewed as required, the bones being occasionally 
anointed with oil. Here and there throughout Konde- 
land are places called Itago, so named from the verb 
kutaga, to castaway. Inthe long past, when a man was 
dying, and all hope of recovery had been abandoned, 
he was carried to the Jtago, placed in a sitting position, 
and left to die. After death the flesh was devoured 
by birds or beasts. Nowhere, so far as I have dis- 
covered, is this repulsive practice now followed. 

The death dance begins as soon as the first wailing 
is over, and continues as long as people continue 
coming in to mourn. The men carry spears or sticks, 
if the dead man was of any importance ; the women 
have leaves or tails. When the dance has fully de- 
veloped, the men form one line, and the women 
another, facing them. The two lines approach each 
other, the men raising their spears and shields, the 
women waving the leaves or tails; at about a yard 
apart they retire again, shouting or singing as the drum 


SOIT sa le 


? gh He a: 
«OS es 


THE DEATH DANCE. 


VARIOUS MOVEMENTS IN 
at arun to a fixed line, then retire, waving spears, 


singing, while the drums beat out their persistent 
5, and other 





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g 
rush about alone, brandishing weapons 


or clubs, shouting and 
the death song in or near the house of the deceased. 


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Death & Burial 297 


beats out its monotonous noise. In the meantime 
there may be uncontrolled persons running about, 
leaping, waving spears, not seldom casting a taunt, 
which is quickly taken up, and spears are thrown, and 
wounds, and even death, may be the result. 

Sometimes the wailing takes place in the house, or 
in the open, just outside. It is interesting to watch 
men and women approach the place of mourning: 
they come with all appearance of sang-froid, but 
suddenly emotion grips them, and they take up the 
wail with streaming tears. It does not occur to anyone 
that he should restrain himself; it was not for that 
that he came. Yet the recovery from this high- 
pitched emotion is just as rapid. ‘There is a sudden 
hush, some one addresses to the widow the old, world- 
old, world-wide comfort, that all must die; and, 
amazing to relate, this is often received with laughter, 
not mocking laughter, but laughter intended to re- 
lieve the strain which all are feeling. Sometimes too, 
jesting, and even obscene language, are indulged in, 
with the same end in view. And as emotion rises 
again, and this especially among the dancers, free rein 
is given to looseness of language and gesture, and more 
definite evil follows in the darkness. 

It is affirmed that all this looseness has arisen since 
the coming of the white man ; but statements of the 
harm done by the latter are so common among the 
Konde and other tribes, that one may well be sceptical. 
The explanation given is that European government 
will not permit the old death penalty for adultery, 
and therefore it has become more common ; or that 


298 Death & Burial 


the number of cattle has increased so greatly since 
European administration commenced, that there are 
many who can pay the fine imposed; or again, that 
since civilized government will not permit the fighting 
that used to take place, the emotion generated has to 
find other outlets. 

As parties from a distance come to the mourning, 
they go first to the ‘“‘ owner ” of the dead, and offer 
their sympathies. In return they are given a long 
account of the progress of the disease, and of the 
measures that were taken by relatives to prevent death. 
A man approaching a widow, will sit at a distance of 
about a yard to offer his condolences, but a woman 
throws her arms around the neck of the bereaved. 

The Konde do not attach the same value to life 
as we do, and suicide is not uncommon. I have known 
of suicide due to small money troubles, loss of a law- 
suit, continued poverty, prolonged illness, leprosy, 
quarrels at home, and finally to disappointment in 
love ; this last, I am told, only on the part of the man ; 
a woman disappointed in love does not commit suicide. 
For people who die by their own act, there is less 
mourning than for an ordinary death, and the parting 
words at the graveside are not the same; “since, it 
was by your own desire that you went.” ‘The spirits 
require an explanation from every one who comes to 
them in this way; but any answer seems to satisfy 
them. Ordinarily the new-comers are received with 
the words, ‘‘ Come and rest.”” "This information comes 
from persons who “died” and returned, though 
a more common belief is that the dead do not return. 


Death & Burial 299 


Lepers are now buried like ordinary persons. But 
in the not very distant past, they were placed in a 
sitting position against a tree, and so left to be de- 
voured. No one of those who carried the body looked 
behind, lest he also should be “‘ caught ” by the disease. 

About a month after the funeral, the beer feast 
takes place. A small quantity is taken to the grave, 
and the dead man is addressed, and bidden again to 
go to his ancestors. ‘‘ Take this beer as an offering 
to them. ‘The ox that we have killed is also for them.” 
The day is given up to eating and drinking, with in- 
tervals of wailing, the men in the open, the women in 
the house of the heir, or near relative of the dead man. 

The ceremonies for women and children are similar 
to those described. A small chief, near Karonga, who 
was utterly neglectful of his mother during her life, 
impoverished himself in the splendour of her funeral. 
The grave was completely lined with expensive cloths, 
and the body was decked out as it never had been in 
life. The man’s grief was genuine; or if it was not 
grief, it was fear of what the old lady, with her 
renewed powers, might do, if he did not attend to 
her now that she was dead. 

When the mourning is over, all the friends of the 
dead man shave their heads. Omission of this cere- 
mony involves the careless one in a quarrel with the 
departed. 

Here and there throughout the country ancient 
customs survive which have been dropped by the 
majority of the people. In many places the entrance 
of the heir upon his new position is accompanied by 


300 Death & Burial 


strange ceremonies. He is taken hold of by the men, 
and the wives of the dead by the women, and put 
into the house, the women being told that this man 
is now their husband. Presently they come out again, 
and the man is garlanded with leaves, and his head 
covered with ashes. When all have washed in running 
water or in the lake, another ceremony must be gone 
through. Bananas and small beans are roasted, and 
the company, led by the doctor, move out on their 
hips to the road, where the doctor digs a small hole, 
into which he inserts a banana, and into the banana 
a bean. One by one the people come up, and stooping 
down, eat the banana without touching it with their 
hands, a fresh banana being placed for each until all 
have eaten. Next, with a white fowl and a bunch of 
bananas, all go to the stream or the lake, where the _ 
fowl and the bananas are dipped twice, and each goes 
in on hands and knees, completely submerged, turns 
right round, and comes out again. ‘The wives now go 
each to her father, to inform him that they have a 
new husband, and the latter sends to each of his 
fathers-in-law a gift of a hoe. 

In the family of the Nyangomale, the heir washes 
all the children of the deceased, big or little, by 
pouring water upon their outstretched hands, himself 
keeping as far off as he can, for none of the water 
must touch him. He and his new wife, or wives, are 
now bound together by the thumbs with bark-cloth, 
and go to the stream, where they wash, and throw 
away the bark-cloth which bound them. A feast 
follows. 


Death & Burial Z01 


The Bakifuna go to the stream to wash, garlanded 
with flowers, and carrying a small stone. [lowers and 
stone are thrown into the stream after the washing, 
and the company re-enter the house. ‘The doctor 
takes water and pours it on the roof, upon which all 
come out one by one, the water dripping on each as 
he or she passes. Anointed with oil, they all go to the 
place of burial, where, resting on elbows and knees, 
they draw themselves along the grave, slightly dis- 
turbing the soil as they go. ‘The hair is then cut, and 
the feast follows. 

When a chief is 7” articulo mortis, his headmen and 
his wives are present, and he is addressed, while still 
living, as common men are addressed at the graveside. 
“Go to God and the spirits; go to your fathers 
(naming them). Rest there, and tell them what is 
happening here above.” 

After he is dead, the nails of his fingers and toes 
are clipped, and his hair cut, and given to the doctor, 
who will make medicine with them to prevent the 
disease which killed the chief passing over to others. 
The dead man is now dressed as common men are 
dressed for burial, but much more elaborately, and, 
if he is a relative of Chungu, he is placed in a sitting 
position in the house, where his wives and headmen 
embrace him for the last time. If he is a very im- 
portant chief, like Chungu, his death is not yet 
announced to the people. 

Meantime a cow has been killed at the place where 
the body is to be buried, and the headmen dig the 


grave, usually by night, if intimation has not been 


302 Death & Burial 


made that the chief is dead. The body is brought 
to the grave by the headmen, and the dead cow is 
lowered in first ; then the chief, in a sitting position, 
facing the Sango country, if that was his original home. 
Torches are used if the night is dark. When the grave 
is filled in, all partake of the medicine made from the 
dead man’s nails and hair. The washing ceremonies 
are the same as for common men; but the widows 
will not go near the men who placed the body in the 
grave until the latter have given them a gift of some 
kind, though the exact function of the gift is not clear. 

No chief of any importance dies a natural death: 
that is to say, however and whenever a chief dies, it is 
assumed that some one was responsible. It is believed 
that chiefs die more easily than common men, and 
are more open to evil influences; but, on the other 
hand, they have more powerful medicines to protect 
them. When Kabeta died in 1922, all his sons and his 
headmen were put to the poison test, and those who 
did not vomit were compelled to pay a fine in cattle, 
a token that complete confidence in the belief in evil 
influences is passing away; for in earlier times the 
culprit so discovered would have been attacked as he 
ran, and would probably have paid the forfeit of his 
own life. The easier punishment may, however, have 
been due to fear of the police. 

‘Twins were not exposed ; but if one of them died, 
the body was cast into the bush, and wailing was not 
permitted, for it would cause the death of the other. 
To-day the body of a twin is buried in the ordinary 
way, but without wailing. 


CHAPTER XXV 
The Brave Days of Old 


IKE the Romans and Greeks, and like many 
peoples at an elementary stage of civilization, 
the Konde place their great days in the past. 
It is, perhaps, a little strange that this should 

be so; for there can be no doubt that the presence 
of the white man has stirred the African everywhere 
to the thought of a new day for his race. But they 
are at the same time conscious that great things were 
done in the past, and among the demands made upon 
me by natives whom I[ have consulted, and who have 
helped me with this book, there is none more insistent 
than that I should include the portentous happenings 
of an older day. 

Old and middle-aged men speak gleefully of the 
days of their youth ; of the great deeds they did when 
they were boys; how they trapped more skilfully, 
caught bigger fish, ran faster, leaped higher than the 
young men of to-day. And the deterioration, they 
assert very emphatically, is due to the presence of 
the white man. Not that the latter discourages 
sport; on the contrary he spurs it on; but in his 
own way, and that is not the Konde way. ‘The white 
man’s way is to give prizes to the winner ; the Konde 

393 


304 The Brave Days of Old 


way is to give the lash to the duffers ; and they claim 
that theirs is the more effective method of bringing 
all up toa high standard. But thrash the ninny to-day, 
and he is off to the Administrative Officer to lodge 
his complaint, which the latter must inquire into. 
And hence much deterioration. 

But these are not the facts of which they wish a 
permanent record to be made. ‘There are other 
things; things which the pagan native profoundly 
believes, and which Christians also believe and take 
pride in, though they think that the missionary will 
object to their holding what he probably calls silly 
ideas. ‘These stories include most of the typical tales 
of olden times: the hero-warrior, the defier of 
tyrants, the mighty medicine man, the great prophet, 
the man who has obtained lordship over Nature in 
some form, and the man who controls the spirits. All 
these, and many more, are included among the Konde 
tales, and I do not place them among folk tales, for 
the people regard them quite differently. A folk tale 
is to-day, whatever it may have been in the past, 
either a mere diversion to pass away an idle moment, 
or a moral for children, or a warning for adolescents. 
The tales which I am thinking of are, in the native 
mind, records of facts, facts which they believe to be 
no longer achievable, but indubitably fact in the past ; 
and no study of the native mind can be complete 
which does not take this into account. 

I. The hero-warrior. Chungu, in his early wan- 
derings in search of a home, came near the hil 


Mphande, the seat of the Simbove rulers of that day. 


The Brave Days of Old 305 


Like the English King Alfred, he determined to be 
his own intelligence department, and, scouting around 
for the best point of attack, he came upon a woman 
working alone in the fields, gathering makuka, heaps 
of grass to be burned before the hoeing. 

““ Who,” he asked the woman, “are the dwellers on 
that hill? ” 

“Are you a stranger here,” she replied, “that you 
do not know that that is the hill of the Simbove? ” 

“Iam going there now,” said Chungu; “if they 
pursue me [ will come to you, and you shall hide me 
in the grass heap. If they ask for me you shall say 
that you know nothing, and if they put you to the 
poison test, you will be acquitted.” 

Setting out again, Chungu crept up the stronghold 
of which he was soon to be master; but he was 
observed, and presently came rushing back to claim 
the woman’s help. Scarce was the grass well over 
him ere his enemies broke in with threatening spears, 
demanding the immediate surrender of the spy. ‘The 
woman boldly kept her secret, and the poison test 
having acquitted her, the Simbove set fire to the 
grass heap by which they were standing, and in which 
Chungu lay concealed, and went on in their pursuit. 
How Chungu escaped from the fire must be left to 
conjecture, but one remembers that he was “ the 
man who speaks with God.” 

He now brought up a herd of elephants, which when 
the Simbove saw, they crowded out with spears to the 
kill; and the invading chief drove the elephants far 


off, so that all the men of warrior age were drawn away 
U 


306 The Brave Days of Old 


from thedefence. Next he brought upa flock of guinea- 
fowl, and all the old and the feeble, and the women 
and children, went out after them, only to be drawn 
away as the men were. Chungu now gave the signal 
to his warriors, who rushed upon the place, seized it 
without opposition, and beat the great drum to apprise 
the whole land that a new lord ruled at Mphande. 

II. ‘The defier of tyrants. Long ago there was a 
chief called Mwambagi. When he killed an ox, he 
called up all his people, bidding them cut up the 
animal, and cook the feast in great pots. But when 
all was ready, he ordered them off to their homes, and 
sat down to devour the food with his favourites, while 
the hungry people, with the savour of the well-cooked 
feast in their nostrils, went sadly to their homes. 
Next day the tyrant went round among his people. 

‘ T hope you enjoyed the feast yesterday,” he leered. 

“O yes, sir,” they answered, “it was very good 
indeed.” 

But there was one man, Kasanda by name, who 
refused to be humbugged any longer; and when one 
day, after the people had suffered this grievous dis- 
appointment, the chief came round to receive their 
hungry and disgusted plaudits, the trouble began. 

“Did you enjoy the feast yesterday,” demanded 
the chief. 

“What feast?” boldly asked Kasanda. ‘“* When 
did you give us a feast? ” 

“TI feasted you yesterday,” said the angry tyrant. 

“You may have feasted others,” was the reply, 
“but I came back hungry.” 


The Brave Days of Old 307 


The enraged bully ordered his men to arrest and 
bind the rebel, and throw him over a precipice called 
“Tkisyo.” But as he was falling over, Kasanda found 
that the ropes that bound him untied of their own 
accord ; and as he rolled downwards, the precipice 
became a gently sloping descent, over which he fell 
without harm. The chief was amazed. 

“How has he escaped?” he anxiously asked his 
attendants. But they merely shrugged their shoulders. 

‘Call to him,” said the chief, “‘ and tell him that 
I have erred.” 

So Kasanda, unharmed by his adventure, walked 
up the sloping ascent, which had been a precipice, 
and which became a precipice again as soon as he 
reached the top, where the chief and his atten- 
dants awaited him. To settle the quarrel, the chief 
gave his daughter to Kasanda, along with four cows, 
and no more demanded praise for good deeds not done. 
“And all the people praised Kasanda, saying, ‘ Thank 
you. Such was the cruelty of Mwambagi, and such 
the courage of Kasanda.” 

III. ‘The people take a pride in the great doctors 
of the past ; for it is the doctors, and not the prophets, 
who are the miracle workers. ‘The Hebrew prophets 
sometimes appeared to control Nature, but in all 
cases it was the act of God, who intervened at the 
prayer of the prophet. In the Konde stories the 
doctor does not pray for Divine intervention, nor are 
his acts regarded as anything but the expression of his 
own powers. 

There were two great doctors, Kasekenye and 


308 The Brave Days of Old 


Gwasa, of equal skill, and deadly rivals in their art. 
One day at a beer feast, a dispute arose, in the presence 
of the two, as to which of them was the greater, and 
a Challenge was issued. Gwasa made medicine, and 
called upon the people to observe the result. Presently 
the sun began to sink towards the earth, and the people 
cried out in terror; but at a sign from Gwasa it re- 
treated again, and resumed its accustomed place in 
the heavens. It was now Kasekenye’s turn. Plucking 
a shrub from the ground, he revealed to the astonished 
gaze of the people a beautiful village of the under- 
world, men going about, or lying in the sun, cattle 
feeding in the meadows, trees and rivers, hills and 
valleys, just as the fathers had told them of the life 
of the underworld. He replaced the shrub, and the 
vision vanished. And no man could tell which of these 
two wonders was the greater, that of Gwasa, or that 
of Kasekenye. 

But trouble came upon the community. The cattle 
became thin, sorcerers abounded, and evil fell upon 
all the people; and the chief called upon the two 
doctors for help. Each sprinkled the ground with 
his chosen medicine; but Kasekenye, hoping to steal 
a march upon his rival, sprinkled another medicine by 
night. But he was punished. His body broke out 
into sores, and he was fain to call in his rival to cure 
him, and the superiority of Gwasa was acknowledged. 
But one minor chief was not satisfied. He called upon 
Gwasa to come and cure him of a pretended illness. 
The angry doctor, immediately perceiving the trap, 
threw his medicine bag against the wall of his patient’s 


The Brave Days of Old 309 


house, where it stuck, and he stalked wrathfully off. 
The gift of an ox calmed his wounded spirit, and he 
removed the medicine bag from the wall. ‘Then 
did all men know that Gwasa was a great doctor.” 
IV. Occasionally others besides doctors controlled 
aspects of Nature. Ntindiwas a great prophet, with- 
out whose advice his chief would do nothing. If he 
told the chief to pray, the people were called, and 
the sacrifices offered. If he foretold smallpox, nothing 
could avert it, except prayer and repentance. When 
he foretold war, the people got ready for fight or flight 
as he advised. He was unlike all other men. Biting 
ants left him alone; bees never stung him; snakes 
cleared from his path. Every one admired him. 
From birth to death his hair was never cut, and no 
word of his ever fell to the ground. To this day the 
people protect their houses from biting ants by 
sprinkling earth from his grave all around, and no ant 
will pass that sacred barrier, for Ntindi is their lord. 
Such stories are very numerous. How did they 
arise? It may be a vain inquiry; but at any rate 
they are more than mere words; they witness to 
something lying deep in the native mind. Were the 
people, or some of them, convinced that life is bigger 
potentially than it is in actual fact? and did they 
invent these stories to satisfy a craving for redemption 
from the commonplace? Or did they believe that 
there is power available for certain persons, which is 
denied to common men? Perhaps uncommon inci- 
dents did occur, which were worked up into their 
present form by unconscious literary genius. It may 


310 The Brave Days of Old 


be that we have here the dim. beginnings of great 
works of imagination, or early forecasts of control 
over Nature by other forces than those of mere magic. 
“Trailing clouds of glory ” behind them, these men 
have vanished from the daily life of the Konde; but 
they went with a reputation that not even the greater 
glory of the white man has been able wholly to 
overshadow. 


Index 


Abakisi mode of fishing, 144 

Abscesses, 278 

Accidental death, compensation 
for, 88 

Adultery, go 

African Lakes Corporation, 22 

Agriculture, 97 ff. 

Ailments and cures, 277 

Amusements and games, 49, 
156 ff. 

Ancestors, see Spirits 

Anger, 246, 268 

Angoni, the, 20, 175, 176, 219 

Animal flesh as food, prohibited, 


99 
Animals, 86, 103, 281 
Ants, 127, 203, 209, 309 
Arabs, the, 21, 175, 176 
Arson, 92 
Arts, 147 ff. 
Association football, 156 
Axes, 149 


Backward look, danger of the, 238 

Banana grove, sacred, 197 

Bananas, 19, 26, 119, 125, 258, 
295, 300 

Bandali, the, 18, 296 

Bark-cloth, 153 

Barrenness, 61 

Baskets and basket work, 142, 144, 
152 

Beads, 154. 

Beds, 27 

Beer, 35, 121, 128, 144 

Beer feast, 299 

Bells, 149 


Benediction, 74, 205 
Betrothal, 51 
Bird hunting, 141 
Birth, 42, 282, 291 
Blacksmith, the, 35, 107, 148 
Boys, names of, 47 
Boys’ work, 48 
Bread, 127 
British rule, 61, 69, 71, 79, 81, 
221, 255 
Bufialo, 73, 134 
omens with reference to, 244 
Bukukwe, 18 
Bundali Hills, 18 
Burial, 70, 78, 98, 173, 293, 299 
of a chief, 301 
of Chungu, 70 
prayer at, 192 " 
Burning of church at Karonga, 92 
Burning of witches, the, 255 


Cannibalism, 127 
Canoes, 149 
Carriers, 122 
Cassava, 125 
Cattle, 27, 33, 56, 62, 63, 86, 109, 
115, 126, 252, 294 
Cattle, poisoned, 113 
Ceremonies : 
betrothal, 52 
birth of twins, 46 
fishing, 142 
maize cobs, 120 
marriage, 59, 60 
war, 103, 117 
Character, 30, 37 
Charm, a powerful, 288 


311 


312 


Charms, 270 ff. 

Charms against lions, 265 
Cheerfulness, 35, 53 
Chief, the, 68 


Chief, privileges and duties of a, 


79 
Chiefs, 29, 75 


Children, 28, 38, 50, 63, 208, 212, 


279; 299 
attractiveness of, 41 
treatment of, 50 

Children’s clothes, 50 


Chungu, 23, 29, 68, 168, 180, 207, 


30 
Church at Kyimbila, the, 146 


Clapping the hands, 47, 74, 99, 


107, 173 
Cloth, native, 147, 153 
Clothes, 29, 50, 59, 134 
Coal, 25 


Cock crowing at night, omen, 245 


Coffee, 25 

Compensation, 82 
Compensation for murder, 87 
Concert, a, 156 

Cooking, domestic, 123 
Cotton, 25 

Counsellors, Chungu’s, 69 
Court, a native, 81 
Cowardice, 103, 173 

Cows, 107, 109 

Crafts, 146 

Crime, 80 ff, 

Crocodile, witchcraft by, 90 
Crocodiles, charms against, 287 
Crops, 18, 19, 119 

Cupping, 282 

Cures for ailments, 277 
Curses, 248 


Dance, war, 171 

Dances : 
Amasere, 161 
Ikikweta, 162 
Lkimbimbt, 160 
Lkinanda, 161 


Index 


Dances— 
Ikindundulu, 161 
Ihisepe, 161 
Ingwata, 161 
Dancing, 33, 159 
Dangers of the bush, 134 
Daughter, punishment of a, 269 
Daughter-in-law, the, 107 
Dead, condition of the, 193 
power of the, 191 
Death, 65, 78, 88, 192, 215,225) 
240, 292 
of a chief, the, 78 
dance, 296 
of chiefs, foretelling the, 219 
Debtors, 289 
Defier of tyrants, the, 306 
Deities, minor, 183 
Diet, items of, 128 
“‘ Disinheriting’? a dead man, 295 
Disobedience, 277 
Ditika, 241 
Divination, 225 ff. 
the author as a subject of, 227 
in cases of poisoning, 235 
in cases of theft, 231 
methods of, 229 
Diviner, the, 116, 226 
Divorce, 61, 92 
Doctor and his fees, 276 
Doctors, 97 
honesty of, 271 | 
of old times, 307 
Dog howling, omen, 245 
Dogs, 115, 138, 203 
Domira, floating of the, 23, 182 
Dowry, 55 ff. 
Dowry cattle, 66 
Dreamers, official, 74, 168, 253, 
259 
Dreams, 216, 248 
Dress, 28 
Drinking, 129 
Drugs and charms, protective, 
177 
Drugs, powerful, 105 









Index 


Drums, 33, 35, 70, 129 
Duties and powers of Chungu, 


_ 73, 74 
Dying, the, 100 


Earthquakes, 215 
Eating, 122 ff. 
Eclipse, 182, 246 
Education, 37 
Eggs, 127 
Elephant traps, 136 
Elephants, 118, 135, 290 
omens with reference to, 242 
tusks the chief’s perquisite, 
138 
Elmslie, Rev. Dr., 213 
Epilepsy, 104, 278 
European Administrative Officers, 
206 
Europeans, 192 
prophecies concerning, 220 
Evil eye, the, 258 


Famine, 219, 242 
Fatalism, 114 — 
Father, the, 27, 42, 56, 96, 252 
Feasts, 35, 46 

beer, 103, 129 

marriage, 59 

of reconciliation, 88 

at succession, 7I 
Fees for divination, 233 
Fertility of the land, 18 
Fever, 279 
Fighting, 171 
Finger-nails, 258 
Firaguli, god, 187 
Fires, ceremony of lighting new, 

76, 99, 133, 171, 240 

First fruits, 120, 241 
Fish, 126 

bait, 143 

first, 107 

hooks, 143 

nets, 144. 

traps, 142 


313 
Fishing, 142 
nets, drugging, 291 
Flax, 25 
Flesh food, 126 
preserving, 138 
Flying serpent, fabulous, 68 
Food, 32, 35, 76, 88, 101, 133 
omens with reference to, 241 
Forbidden things, see Prohibi- 
tions 
Foretellers, 215 ff., 222 
Fotheringham, Monteith, 23 
Fowls, 115, 245 
Foxes, 24.5 
Frogs, 100 


Game laws, 135 
pits, 135 
Games, 52 
football, 156 
Ikimbenengwa, 157 
Tkyula, 158 
Ingongwe, 157 
Eya kalenda, 158 
Pamba nstlilt, 158 
“ Turwe na Babemba,’’ 158 
of skill, 162 
Garden pests, 119 
thief, the, 94. 
Germans, the, 25, 177, 187, 217 
Girl initiates, 51 
Girls, occupations of, 50 
names of, 48 
Goats, I15 
God, 24, 96, 98, 178 ff., 182 ff., 
184, 224, 228, 246 
Gods, minor, 183 
** God’s rain,” 211 
Gold, 25 
Grandparents, 44 
Grave, the, 97, 294 
of dead chief, 196 
Graves, as places of worship, 197 
Great War, forecasts of the, 221 
Greetings, 27 
Grief, 276 


314 


Hair, cutting the, 44, 59, 100, 
224, 258 
Headache, 282 
Heatn7, 31 
Heavens, the, 246 
Heir, an, 300 
Henga, the, 184 
Herbs, knowledge of, 270 
Herding cattle, 48, 109 
Hero-warrior, the, 304 
Hill spirits, 199 
Hippo hunting, 136 
Hoeing, 117 
Hospitality, 241 
House-breakers, 84 
Housebuilding, 155 
Houses, 26, 154, 260, 289 
Human sacrifice, 208 
Hunters, 133, 137 
Hunting, division of the bag, 
137 
medicines, 290 
season, an unsuccessful, 138 
weapons, 133 


Igale Hills, 19 

Lkimbimbi dance, 160 

Llala, the, 22 

Illnesses, 275 

Incisions, 284. 

Inguluka, the, 267 

Insignia of chiefs, 68 

Installation of a chief’s successor, 
75 

Insults to parents, 248 

Inytfewira, the, 274 

Iron, 147 

Irrigation, 119 

Isoko, 19 

Isota, 252 

Itete, 19 


Johnston, Sir H., 23, 263 
Journey, 105, 205 
omens concerning a, 239 


Index 


Kabeta, 105, 245, 263 
death of, 302 
lion-maker, 264 

Kaloso, chief, 262 

Kamanga, the, 22 

Kambwe, god, 187 
lagoon, 23 

Karonga, 17, 21, 176 
thieves, 86 

Kasoka, the, a cure for madness, 

277 

Kasuchi, the, 244 

Kibira, R., 18 

Kidneys, 104 

Kinga, the, 19 
chiefs, 168 
Mountains, 19, 208 

Kisyombe, pool at, 198 

Knives, 149 

Kungu fly, 127 

Kyabara Chungu, 20 

Kyimbila Station, 18 


Land laws, 93 

Law, 60 ff., 287 

Laws, Rev. R., 213 

Lawsuit, 288 

Laziness, 29 

Leather work, 154 

Leopard hunting, 139 

Leopards, 241 

Lepers, 299 

Leprosy, 284 

Lightning, 99, 181 

Lion hunting, 140 

Lion-maker, the, 263 

Lions, 33, 70, 97, 100, 104, 127, 
139, 195, 237 

Livingstonia Mission, 17 

Lizard, 100 

Lot, the, 234 

Lusero or medicine basket, 172, 


173, 175 


Magistrate, 36 
Maize cobs, 120, 125 


Index 


Malaria, 208 
Manners, 105 
Marongo, land of, 184 
Marriage by capture, 59 
gifts, 58 
negotiations, 57 
Married life, 66 
Maseke, prophet, 220 
Masoko, 18 
Mbasi, 168, 185 
Mbeye Mountain, 19 
Meals, 124. 
Medicine, 88, 113, 118, 133, 169, 
170, 260, 276 
basket, 172 
drinking, ceremony of, 76 
used by thieves, 84, 85 
against witchcraft, 259 
Mental troubles and their treat- 
ment, 276 
Merere, Sango chief, 176 
Mice, plague of, due to witch- 
craft, 257 
Midwife, the, 43 
Milk, 111 
Milk and witchcraft, 253 
Milking, 33, 110 
Millet, 129 
Mimicry, 49, 159 
Mlozi, 23 
Moir, Mr., 218 
Moon, the, omen, 246 
Morality, 44, 52 
Morality and religion, 80 
Mother, the, 42, 45, 48 
care of a, 106 
Mourning, 292, 297 
for Chungu, 71 
Mphande, 21, 197, 304 
Mulima, the, 206 
Mumps, 288 
Munsoso, 167 
Murder, 85, 87, 89, 104 
Music, 158 
Mwafongo, chief, 78, 103 
Mwaisumo, chief, 117 


315 
Mwakalinga, chief, 102 
Mwakarobo, 167 

Mwakipesire, prophet, 220 
Mwamba, 17 

Mwandisi, prophet, 217 
Mwangonde or Chungu, chief, 20 
Mwanjebe, god, 187 
Mwankosore, sorcerer, 267 


Mwenekasangamara, doctor, 269 
“* Mwiko,” 95 ff. 


Nakanjere, seer, 222 
Nakedness, 105 
Names, 49 

marriage, 64 

in use for the Deity, 179 
Naming the child, 47 
Needles, 149 
Net making, 152 
Nets, 144. 
News, good or bad, indications of, 

239 

Ngeketo, god, 20, 184. 
Night, 33 

prohibitions connected with, 

99 

Nightmare, 177 
Njuli, prophet, 217 
Nserya region, the, 20 
Ntindi, a great prophet, 309 
Nyakyusa, the, 18 
Nyakyusa thieves, 82 
Nyasa, L., 17 


Occupations, 35 
Offerings to spirits, 199 
Omens and portents, 194, 237 ff. 

cock-crowing, 245 

death, 244 

dog howling, 245 

elephants, 242 

food, 241 

mole, 244 

moon, 246 

serpents, 239 

sun, 236 


316 


Omens and portents— 

tree falling, 240 

Wal, 243 
Omission, sins of, 98 
Omnipotence, Konde idea of, 183 
Overtoun Institution, 187, 213 
Owl, 100 
Ownership of land, 93 


Pango or stringed instrument, 31 
Parents, insults to, 248 
Penalties, 39 
Pipes, burned clay, 147 
Poison, a deadly, 133 
for fish, 142 
murder by, 89 
ordeal, 113, 235, 254 
Poisoners, 268 
Polling of cattle, 112 
Pollution, 294. 
Polygamy, 63 
Pools inhabited by spirits, 198 
Porridge for spirits, 139 
Portents, 240 ff. 
of war, 168 
Possessed persons, 224. 
Post mortem marks as evidence of 
witchcraft, 261 
Post mortems, 284 
Pottery, 151 
Prayers, 24, 42, 45, 71, 74, 117, 
132, 139, 179, 196, 201, 204, 
205, 206, 209, 265, 266, 273, 
277, 280, 281 
Prayer at burial, 192 
Predictions concerning wild 
beasts, 223 
Pregnant woman, murder of a, 88 
Preserving meat, method of, 126 
Priest, 196 
“ Priest,” the family, 99 
Priest-kings, 68 
Prisoners, 174 
Prohibited animals as food, 99 
degrees, 60 
names, 97 


Index 


Prohibited places, 97 
acts, 98 
Prohibitions, 95 
Prophecies, 22 
Prophecy, 168, 216 
Prosperity, 255 
Proverbs, 178 
Puberty, 51 
Punishments for adultery, 92 
Purification by smoke, 51 
Python, killing a, ror 


Quarrels, 61, 130, 171 


Rain ceremonies, 206 
dance, children’s, 212 
forest, a, 210 
stopping, 212 
Rainmaker, the, 210 
Rains, 32 
Reconciliation, 249 
Relaxations, 156 ff. 
Religion of the Konde, 116 
Religious people, the Konde, 200 
Reprisal, the law of, 86 
Reuben, chief, 217 
Rheumatism, 282 
Riddles, 163 
Righteousness, Konde idea of, 
181 
Rinderpest, 114 
“Rod of lordship,” the, 72 
Rungwe, pool at, 198 


Sacrifices, 99, 190, 209 
Safwa, the, 19 
Saliva, the, 44, 104, 105, 203 
Salutations, 105 
Sango, the, 19 
chiefs, 168 
Seers, 222 
Serpent, fiery flying, 274 
Serpents’ movements as omens, 


239 
Shadow of dead, 295 


Index 


Sheep, 115 
Shields, 170 
Sickness, 36, 203, 216, 227, 270 ff. 
Sincerity, 226 
Skill, games of, 162 
Slavery, 38 
Smallpox, 204, 218, 283 
due to witchcraft, 256 
** Smelling out ”’ of witches, 254 
Smoke, 46, 52, 232 
Snake bite, treatment of, 276, 281 
Snake, two-headed, I00 
Snakes, 195, 200, 237, 239, 252, 
267 
Songwe, R., 17 
Sorcerers, 127, 218 
Sorcerers’ means of self-defence, 
262 
Sores, 281, 288 
Spears, 57, 84, 149, 169, 170 
fish, 143 
Spirit forms, 195 
hut, the, 197 
Spirits, 43, 179, 190 ff, 
non-human, 197 
anger, evidences of, 200 
Spitting, ceremonial, 203 
Successor, choosing a, 71 
Suicide, 298 
Sun, the, omen, 246 
Supreme Being, see God 
Sympathetic magic, 112, 142 
Syphilis, 279 


Table manners, 124 

Tabu, 95 ff. 

Tales, 164 

Tax-collector, 35 

Taxes, Chungu’s, 73 

Theft, 82 ff., 94, 227 

Theft, divination in case of, 231 

Thieves’ charms, 289 

Tie, marriage, 60 

Timidity of the Konde, 176 

Tokens of a coming traveller, 
240 


3 Fh 
Toothache, 270 
Traditions, early, 20 
Traps, 135 
for birds, 141 
fish, 143 
for leopards, 139 
Tree falling, as an omen, 240, 246 
planting, ceremony of, 75 
Trespass, law of, 93 
Tukuyu, 18 
Twins, 46, 59, 107, 302 
Two-headed snake, 240 
Tyrants, defier of, 306 


Ulcers, cure of, 273, 284 
Umputi, or person who prays, 202 
Unborn child, the, 42 
Uncleanness, 97 

Unfaithfulness, 56, 61, 87 


Unnatural actions, forecast of, 


247 


Vegetable food, 125 

Victory, methods of securing, 175 
Villages, Konde, 26 

Virtues, 38 

Visitors, 35, 73, 107 

Voracity, 123 


Wailing, 71, 292, 297 
War, 102 
causes of, 168 
dreams, 168 
omens with reference to, 243, 
245 
portents, 168 
prophecy, 168 
religious ceremonies of, 103 
Water spirits, 197 
Weapons, 170 
Weather lore, 239 
Weaving, 147, 153 
Wheels, absence of, 147 
White man, 30, 32, 34, 102, 122, 
192, 267, 272, 304, 310 
fear of the, 41 


318 


White man— 
prohibitions connected with 
the, Ior 
prophecies, 22, 220 
stimulus of the, 147 
Widower, the, 65 
Widows, 65 
Wife, position of the, 64 
Witchcraft, 90, 251 ff. 
degrees of power, 252 
destructive agencies of, 263 
punishments for, 257 
quarrel brought on by, 89 
Witches and warlocks, methods 
of, 255, 258 


The Mayflower Press, Plymouth 
1925 


Index 


Wives, 52, 55 ff., 87, 106 
purchase of, 55 
Women, 244 
prohibitions connected with, 
106, 133, 136, 172 
Wonder medicine, 286 ff. 
Wood noises, 194 
Woodwork, 151 
Worship, 190 
places of, 196 
Wounded, the, 174 
Wounds, treatment of, 285 


Zebra tail of office, 169 


William Brendon and Son, Ltd. 


Map for ‘ The Spirit Ridden Konde.”’ 




















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